A minimalist Fence Design

Netib is a blog and soon to come Studio based in Addis Ababa. On this blog we will be creating creative contents. Stay tuned for further.

Introduction

As a first blog post, I will post my progress in capturing my process of creating a front yard green area fence.

This is my first project in wood working. experience wise I need to practice more to further improve my wood working skill.

I will be post the whole progress of this project in this blog. in fact at the time of writing this post, the project wasn't fully finished. I still had to change , add or modify some aspect of the fence.  the fence is made to mark the boundary for a green area found at front of the house.since it is found at the front of the house , aesthetics and function should be considered. a cool looking fence that protects the greenery and vegetation behind it.call it a 'fency' yard :).

Preparation and site clearing

at first preparation must be made for the land on which plants and flowers be planted. Clearing of bushes, and other waste from the area was first. Then leveling the ground and preparing the area for further processes was done.one thing to note is the ground I am doing the work was covered on cobblestone, so I had to remove the cobblestone and layers of red sand and gravel found beneath the stone. 

After reaching the soil in the ground beneath the stone, all I did was level the ground and clear all unnecessary rocks and rock fragments from the soil.

Structure and support

digging a hole for the posts to hold the fence and setting up a base was done after land clearing is done. I dug four holes at equal distance from each other. they will be the support to hold the later coming fence units. When the holes were dug and ready, I  planted the posts. I changed my first idea of using longer posts.

but, I later changed the height of the post so as to make the later coming fence units seem like they are floating , as the background support post wont be visible once the panels/fence units are erected.

the base for the posts to stand on was done with stones collected manually from the river and filled in a wire mesh ( used to make hen cage).the front side of the base is the stones from the river the back side is filled with cobble stone which I removed earlier.

fence panels

the fence unit ( I call them panels).this panels were made from barks like wood from a wood milling shop  near by. These woods can be used to make this kind of fences or to make a traditional looking walls.

as seen above the panels were made from eco friendly and recyclable material.I made the panel design so as it is minimal, yet it creates somewhat 'not boring' wood patterns, when the whole fence is erected.

at first I was intending to place the panel without painting it. but the painted version seem to be better and the paint will protect it from water and moisture.so I had to paint it.

I used two color, red and black. the black paint was an oil based wood/metal paint.

no further additional layer was need to protect the wood or the paint as it is made durable can last long. 

the red paint however, is not an oil based paint. it was a soil paint or grounded ( I don't know the exact name ). it is colored soil mixed with water. I had to paint it with a varnish layer to protect the wood and the red paint from water and sun light exposure.

I then attached a horizontal wood on the posts I planted earlier. This will be where the panels will be attached.

individual panels were made separately. this makes it easier to produce in bulk and also keeps the styling of the fence more or less the same. the scratches were done when I was connecting the panel element (which I did after painting) and face down on the painted face. which can be fixed by repainting on it later.

Finally I attached the wood panels on these wood planks. This concludes the installation and making of the fence.

or so I thought. Why? because I got into a problem when installing the panels. The shorter wood posts in turn making the support planks lower made it hard to firmly hold the panels in place.the intention to make the planks seems like they are floating made it hard to strongly attach them in place as the only had smaller and lower area of contact.

as a temporary solution I attached electric cables amn tied them to the ground. this seem to hold them in place. although it is stronger that before the planks I used were somewhat irregular in shape, this made the panels wobbly.

as a final solution I am planning to make a sturdy structure which can firmly hold the panels in place and make the whole thing stronger. I will make the progress of that in future posts.

Thanks again for tuning in.