Take note of the prevailing wind direction and site your centre aisle to catch the breeze. Make use of ridge vents and insulation. Install centre overhead fans for each stall. If your mats are properly fitted liquid will not get under them. Concrete/matted floors save horses legs. Make sure you also have cross ventination. Allow airflow through all stalls by having bars on upper partitions instead of solid.
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I was just getting ready to ask-- Assume the most wind comes from the west in my location. Do I want the center aisle aligned east to west? Or north to south? This particular property is wide open farmland to the west, as well as a wide river to the west for accentuated winds. It has woods to the north and east.
I am hoping I can afford crosshatch mesh for stall fronts. Another question-- Should I align the back stall door with the front stall door or will the shavings blow right out? I guess that’s more of a question if the stall front is some solid mixed with mesh.
And unfortunately, I do not have the luxury of getting to know the property. The build and moving of horses will take place this spring. I do plan to ask the old-timers and farmers how it behaves. In fact, I need to introduce myself to the man who currently farms it . . .
If you are where hot is more of a problem than cold, as I think you are, you may want to make your West side of the barn more solid, normally the North side also and put stalls with runs either South, East or SE.
Your worst heat will come from the lowering western sun in the summers, but also if you are very humid, stalls and runs on the South side, preferably with some kind of overhang, will stay more dry with the sun’s heat all day, which they would not if in the East side.
A trade-off there, why most barns most everywhere tend to be oriented where the stalls with runs are on the South/SE side.
Also consider no skylights on the roof, they bring light and are super for that, but also heat in the summer and break easily with hail, but maybe large North wall transparent panels.
A friend made large sliding windows on both North and South side for summer, but said he mostly uses the North ones in the summer, South ones in the winter.
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over time, I have become pretty good at skimming when I’m using the muck rake; it’s been years since I broke a tine, lol. I use this basket type.
my horses have to spend a lot of time in the barn. I can get away with cleaning their pee spots every 2-3 days. That’s when I use the big aluminum shovel and it glides right across the mats as if they were solid. I only have to completely strip their stalls out a couple times a year. Even though I have geldings, they are both pretty neat and pee in the same areas of their stalls all the time. Thats how I get away with only doing a few wall-to-wall strippings throughout the year:)
The other advantage to the grid mats is they don’t have to be picked up once or twice a year for cleaning – I’m way too old for that, lol
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This is so thoughtful–thank you so much. What you said here prompts a question that has been niggling at me.
The concept is for a center aisle barn with 12x12 stalls and 12x12 runs with lean-to roof overhead. I have struggled with whether to have feed and tack rooms on opposite sides of the aisle or have them side-by-side. I originally thought I’d like to have them side-by-side but then that would wreck the cross-ventilation for the stalls across the aisle from them. But with what you’re describing here I’m wondering if I should go back to that idea and have them on the west side, with at least two stalls across from them being sheltered from the west.
On the other hand, since I plan the 12’ lean-to’s on both sides, the west side would still stay shady the bulk of the afternoon, I think.
And there should be a decent breeze from the west most days so I’d be cutting that off.
Am I chasing my tail?
Block is a good building material. The first four feet of our barn is block, with wood on top of that and metal roof.
You’re not going to do a block roof…right!!! 
G.
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But of course! Piece of Cake.
No, not the roof obviously and I’ve seen some block barns with tongue and groove ceilings and timber rafters which are really beautiful if you have the funds to go artistic.
Does that add strength? Having the first four feet block?
I am always aware of the critters that can be running around inside the walls of a barn. The only thing that would prevent it is poured concrete like a basement.
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The stone would be stronger than wood and it would discourage termite intrusion, though nothing is 100% termite proof unless there is no wood in your structure. Also, there has to be less fire risk with a stone barn as well, another important aspect to consider. My property came with an old rambling barn structure that is perfectly adequate for our needs. It has 6 stalls, 3 along one side of a big loafing shed, a loft (which we don’t use), plus room for hay and equipment storage; a feed closet and tack room. It’s 30+ years old and would go up in the blink of an eye in an electrical fire so I try not to keep anyone in stalls if I don’t have too especially since during the week, we’re gone 12hrs of the day. If we stay on the property into retirement, I would love to bulldoze it and design a replacement barn to my specifications and given our hot, humid summers here, it will be of stone and quite open and airy.
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A veterinarian I know has a block barn similar to the first photo (of the three) that Fat Cat Farm posted; it is so cool and airy in hot/humid (although perhaps not quite as humid as you’ll experience) weather.
I’ve been quite happy with my MD modular barn but - after see her barns (she has another, more closed, in that is also block) and another few at other farms in my area - if I was building from scratch, as opposed to modular, I would seriously consider block.
Block, stone and concrete = thermal mass. The more thermal mass your building has, the more likely the inside temperatures will not fluctuate as much as the outside temperature. In the hot summer, remember that cold air sinks and hot air rises. The air over your concrete isle will be cooler than the air at your head level. Design your stall placement so that the winds coming in will move this cooler air into the interior of the barn to exit on the opposite end, including windows. A fan placed on the floor will help facilitate this.
Getting back to thermal mass, the block, stone and concrete will heat up during the day and cool down at night. During the day, these thermal masses will give up it’s cold by seeking equal temperature with the air, thus cooling the barn during the day. At night, the process reverses and the thermal masses gives off it’s heat…as long as the air is cooler than the mass, again seeking equal temperature with the air. Insulation is really important to help with this process.
My barn is situated at the top of a hill in a direct north/south configuration. We have good summer winds, however, bringing in the hot summer air into our cool barn would be really ugly if not for the shade trees planted 20 feet from our north facing entrance. Shading the entrance reduces the air temperature by several degrees before it enters our barn.
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I’m right on the coast in southeastern NC so I’m quite familiar with the near constant 70%+ humidity year around! Sounds like we’re building similar style barns also. The spot where I’m building my barn is more of a sandy loam and drains quite well as it’s on one of the higher spots on our property. Having boarded at a barn for the last 10yrs that does not have great drainage, this was something very important to me also! I decided to pour concrete for my center aisle but will be using a clay mix base with rubber mats in my stall. I also made sure that the inside of my barn is built up from the footing level on the outside so that the moisture absolutely drains away from the barn and stalls.
We went with slightly higher ceilings on the inside to help with air flow. My barn is oriented almost directly North-South, so the end of the barn/sliding doors takes the brunt of the cold wind in the winter but can also be more open to South winds which we tend to get during the summer. Plus the lean-to off the stalls is on the east side and provides good protection from the hottest part of the afternoon sun. Also planning to install fans in each stall for added air flow.
Tack/feed room will be insulated and have at the very least a dehumidifier in there. Most likely will have some type of mini-split system just to keep things from freezing and to combat the constant moisture when storing feed and tack.
Edited to add: My barn foundation is 3-4 blocks high with walls framed up on top of that. This was done partially to combat rot/termites but also to help provide a solid foundation for the building to withstand the wind uplift during hurricane season.
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Fabulous info. Thank you for sharing!
Since my OP, we’ve decided on north/south concrete center aisle. Probably going to save some money and use a drainable material either with those grid thingies or with rubber mats in stalls.
So grateful for this type of feedback!
I live in middle GA, very hot and humid. Our barn is a raised center aisle oriented E/W with a 16’ aisle, windows on N side and Dutch doors on S side. So plenty of cross air flow and I put a huge barrel fan at one end of the barn during the hot summers as well as each stall has their own barn fan. We also can close up all the windows and the aisle way if needed when the weather is cold and windy (wind comes out of the N then brrr). There are 2 things I wished I had done to manage the heat: insulate the ceiling (barn builder only had the insulation available that I’ve seen birds tear up over the years. I would not do that at the time the barn was built. I want to go back and have foam insulation put in now. Have an end eve fan put on temp control.
My barn is on clay, we did a concrete pad for the aisle and for the Barnmaster barn to be put on, but the stalls are screenings with mats. Best mats I’ve found are the ones from the quarry (I had several come with me from our old farm) rubber belting that does not shift as easily as the bought mats. I would never do concrete, I would do asphalt. I have drains in my aisle. My barn is 86’ long, I did do skylights for better light, too long of a barn for just the light coming in from openings to make much difference. I hate a dark barn. No issue with them.
I do not have runs off my stalls. Not something I have liked in the past with other barns. The runs get muddy and just more to pick out.
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I had these ridge ventilators in my old barn; http://www.rmsteel.com/accessories/ridge-vents/
You could open and close them.
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I have an outside industrial fan under an overhang on a timer. The overhang is outside the stalls that open on the pasture and there is a cement pad with rubber mats. The horses love it and the fan not only cools them, it keeps flies off and keeps that stomping down.
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I’m in south LA, the heat and humidity capital.
My barn aisle is directly E/W, which lets the prevailing winds come right down the aisle to help cool. The stalls on the north side have windows with solid doors I can close in winter or during hurricanes. The south side stalls have full-width bars, so are open 365. In winter, I close the end doors on the aisle and the north windows, and even with the south side open, it’s comfortable in there! (Well, we did get to 11 degrees this winter, but the north side water buckets didn’t freeze!)
Several years ago, I put a ridge vent in the roof, which helps vent heat, and I also did spray-foam insulation in the roof, which helps in both summer (huge difference!) and winter, and prevents the condensation from raining down off the underside of the metal roof when the temperature changes. I did put plywood over the foam insulation, because the yellow-orange color it turned when cured was ugly!
I do have boards I can attach to the south side bars if we are going to get hurricane winds from the south, but my barn went through Katrina with just the windows and doors closed, and we had 100mph north winds.The openness helped afterwards when we had no power for a month and I couldn’t run fans.
I do have overhangs over all windows to cut down on rain blowing in, and I have overhangs over both ends of the aisles to prevent rain and direct sun (and to give the farrier a covered place so he can work out of his truck).
Oh, and my stalls are compacted road base (sharp gravel), with rubber mats.
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I hope you know that the COTH rule is that if you ask questions about barn construction you are required to post photos of your building project.
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