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    Building Efficient Horse Barns

    August 2nd, 2010

    Future champions deserve royal treatment. Someone who helps you in your work needs must be treated the same as well. So why put your horses in barns that are not liveable? But before moving them from their makeshift barns to the most expensive and priciest horse barns you could find, there’s a lot of things to consider. Well-structured, well-constructed horse barns are well-ventilated, light, roomy, comfortable to work and stay in. Top horseman and horse barn builder Champ Hough even suggests that horse barns should be as homey to your horses as your house feels like home to you. He shares several tips from over thirty horse barn building experience.

    Hough suggests that before deciding on your plan, an appropriate site must be first decided. By appropriate, it means a site that would give your horse barns the much-needed air circulation and proper drainage. This would prevent epidemics within your barn. A good site would also provide your barn easy access to utilities, your driveway, or the road. Hough recommends orienting barns with these in mind. For aesthetic purposes, keep useful but unsightly features like the manure bin or can far from roads and your house but near your barn. Delivery docks and ramps should also be situated in the same manner. He also reminds builders not to mix delivery and horse traffic for less inconvenience. In doing barn layouts, Hough shares his trick. He suggests minimizing steps or the distance between barn workstations literally. This means that water stations, feeding stations, and grooming stations must be within reach or near each other. He also recommends, confining or isolating potentially messy areas like stalls and bathing areas to reduce dirt in the general barn. Clustering stalls is a good option.

    Horse barns are usually built with 12 ft aisles but Hough insist that it is better if you give your barn aisles another couple of feet. This will enable machinery to enter the barn, and will give horses and caretakers ample room to maneuver inside. A wider doorway will also let in more light and improve air circulation. Installing screens on windows and sliding doors will reduce fly population while installing exhaust fans would let hot air out to be replaced by cooler air. Hough suggest the use of pavers and asphalt on horse barn floors for better drainage. Plus, these materials are easier on your horses’ legs.In time, you’ll get the benefit of having less vet bills, less upkeep and maintenance costs, and an increase in property value. With proper horse barns, your horses will be healthier, breed better, and have champion quality offsprings.

    Bespoke Wallpaper

    July 19th, 2010

    Wallpaper has been around for hundreds of years, and yet people claim that there has been very little advancement in wallpaper. At the surface it might seem like a remark that seems true, but the truth is far from it, wallpaper has evolved from the really old looking red and white stripe paper, to a work of art that can adorn your home, or your work place. There are more or less no limits to the colours, variations and styles you can choose from, the best part is, contrary to popular belief wallpaper has evolved and changed as time has gone by, and they are no longer just another thing you put on your walls.

    Just like art and fashion has evolved, so have the various styles of wallpaper, earlier wallpaper was made to resemble the various tapestry styles, as fashion style and taste of people evolved, the wall papers became more and more diverse. Just like clothing, technology and so many other things today, wallpaper has now come to reflect the taste and moods of a home owner. With the numerous advances in technology, the method of printing wallpaper too has advanced, earlier massive offset printers, or block printers were used to manufacture wallpaper, where as today more and more people are turning to digitally printed wallpaper for their homes.

    Today wallpaper is classified based on the commercial application, and is divided into two categories commercial and home use wallpaper

    Commercial Wallpaper

    Commercial wallpaper is usually printed on thicker, and more resistant paper. Since commercial wallpaper (as the name suggests) is used in retail outlets, hotels, discos etc. The wallpaper has certain health and safety specifications that it must meet like being fire resistant etc. Apart from the health and safety requirements, there are additional requirements like being easy to clean, dust and dirt resistant etc. What has made commercial wallpaper making an entirely different section, is that more often than not commercial wallpaper involves customization like having a company logo printed or having custom designs, this is where having a digitally printed wallpaper comes in handy, as the imagery that is produced using digitally printed wallpaper is far superior when compared to wallpaper printed using traditional methods.

    Wallpaper for home use

    The earliest and oldest application of wallpaper is for home use, wallpaper for home use is by no way inferior to commercial wallpaper, as it too has to meet strict quality control guidelines, however the added advantage that wallpaper for home use has is that, it is easier to apply when compared to commercial wallpaper, and in addition you can have multiple wallpaper in the same home (compare this to commercial establishments where the wallpaper is uniform throughout). Just like commercial wallpaper, digitally printed wallpaper is available for home users also, the biggest benefactors of digitally printed wall paper have been home owners, who can now either get custom wallpaper with a particular design built, or can choose to adorn their home walls with some of the greatest works of art ever made. The choices that wallpaper today has bought to home owners is just mind boggling, and all it takes to get customized wallpaper made is a photograph or image of your design.