THE STORY OF THE CUPOLA

I've always loved cupolas (pronounced kyoo'-puh-luh). They are so adorable. Once, William and I stayed in a guest house that was a converted barn. The cupola was reworked to become a quaint sitting room. After spending an evening up there, we casually mentioned that if we ever had an opportunity, we'd get a cupola of our own. 

What exactly is a cupola? Well, the word cupola comes from the Latin meaning "little cupo" or little dome, and originally referred to the small domes atop cathedrals which allowed light to enter the sanctuary. Here in America, traditional wooden cupolas are most commonly seen on barns and elegant cupolas adorn some public buildings. 

Since we are in the midst of building our house, we decided it was time to make our dream of having a cupola come true. It's not finished yet, but here is the story of the cupola and its progress.

This barn is on the way out to our property and I love it. I told our carpenter to make the roofline like this one with a point on all four sides. Cupolas function on barns to help with climate control. We are curious about how this will allow us to cool our house by pulling warm air up and out the cupola windows.

As they were framing the house, they opened up a hole for the cupola.

This was the first "sketch" of the cupola. They put up some boards so we could get a sense of how it would integrate into the rest of the house. We decide to go a bit taller than this.

Here's the view to the South from the cupola platform.

Another view of the original sketch.

It's pretty high up! Those guys are tiny down there.

This is a view of the framing of the cupola from the scaffolding.

The framing.

The guys finishing up the frame work.

They used the SkyTrek to bring the supplies up.

A view of the whole house after the cupola was enclosed.

This is the bedroom loft. You can see the hole in the ceiling going to the cupola. It is now a 3 foot square, which will be opened up further when the staircase is added.

The view out at the trees from the cupola before it was enclosed.

The window design for the north and south facing windows.

The cardboard panels, which we moved around to decide the exact placement of the windows before they began framing them in.

The framed in windows before the windows arrived.

The installed windows (facing south).

A panorama of the west, north and east facing windows inside the cupola (click for larger image).

The whole house with the cupola. The scaffolding will be coming off soon.

The completed trim and roofing on the cupola (with Jesse).

Once the scaffolding comes down, it will be a bit tricky to put siding on it but the carpenters think they have a plan. The inside of the cupola is 8'x8'. We'll put a U-shaped booth inside so it will be a comfortable place from which to view the whole property. Imagine star-gazing up there! We can't wait.

This is the woodwork (soft maple) on the ceiling of the cupola.

A finished wall inside the cupola.