faq
Our company
I became interested in timber frames when I worked at Old Sturbridge Village, a living history museum, in the early 1970s. Working in the old barns, tending the oxen, cows, and sheep, made me appreciate how attractive and functional these post and beam structures were after more than 150 years.
My next formative experience there was learning to reproduce antique furniture with mortise-and-tenon joints and dovetails. Then I went on to help the museum develop a post and beam building program. But I soon found myself yearning to bring lessons from the past into the present by designing and constructing buildings for today’s needs, using sturdy timbers and the time-tested joinery I’d learned.
That’s just what I’ve been doing for the last thirty years. Hardwick Post & Beam has designed, cut, and erected hundreds of timber homes, barns, stores, restaurants, and other public buildings, each one different. My son started going to frame raisings with me when he was thirteen. Now he helps manage the business.
Our crew is a small group of craftsmen who understand and participate in every phase of the work, from designing the frame to cutting the joints, to erecting the building on site. That’s the way it's always been and is always going to be. We can accept virtually any job, no matter how challenging or painstaking, because we have a skilled, versatile team. Also, our tools are portable rather than stationary, which gives us flexibility in terms of the projects we can undertake in our workshop. And then on the job site, the crew works with such ease and efficiency that clients are almost as impressed with the teamwork as they are with their frame!
Doing skilled work, with great people, on interesting projects, for appreciative clients—it doesn’t get any better than that.
Ridge Shinn, President
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