Uthland-Frisian house
The Uthland-Frisian house (
Design
The farmhouses have the features of all Frisian houses: the walls are made of red brick and have a
The farmhouses are built on an east–west axis in order to present the smallest possible surface area to the prevailing westerly winds. The entrances to the stall and living areas are on the leeward southern side. Because the size of the house is necessarily restricted due to its design, there are often adjacent animal sheds. One striking feature is that all buildings of such an ensemble have their entrances on the same side. This is particularly noticeable on the Halligen. Because cattle farming and sailing were the main means of livelihood in the areas concerned, large store rooms for the harvest were not needed. As a result, Uthland-Frisian houses had no space for grain and hay storage apart from the attic.
Unlike the
The structural load of these houses rests on a frame of posts and beams, which means that the load of the roof and the hayloft is born by wooden posts that are positioned inside the non-load bearing outer walls. The outer walls only serve as protection against the weather and can be designed to be relatively weak from a structural loading perspective. Because islands and Halligen were largely treeless, marine debris, such as ships' masts and planks washed up on the shore, was used for the internal timber frame.
The foundation of the houses, which had no cellars as a rule, consisted of field boulders. In several houses, under the kitchen, a low store room was let into the ground and walled with boulders to act as a cold store and storage room.
Another feature of the Uthland-Frisian houses is the
Well preserved and typical Uthland houses, such as Tadsen (built 1741) and Sönnichsen (today housing the local history museum), for example, are found on the Hallig of Langeneß; another one is the Öömrang Hüs on Amrum. Haus Olesen, originally built in 1617, was demolished and rebuilt in Wyk auf Föhr, and is now the oldest preserved house of this type. It, too, belongs to a local history museum.
References
- ^ ISSN 0946-896X
Sources
- Ellen Bauer, Ludwig Fischer, Hans Joachim Kühn, Matthias Maluck & Dirk Meier: The Schleswig-Holstein Wadden Sea Region. Lancewad Report 2001 des Wattenmeer-Sekretariats. Download page