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Farm owners accumulate a lot of things. From tack to stall cleaning supplies to pasture maintenance equipment, there is often an endless inventory of items that need a place to live.
When you plan your dream farm, it's important to consider every detail, not just the exciting elements like your stalls and riding arena. If you don't plan for storage, you'll find that housing the amount of stuff required to run your farm will quickly become overwhelming.
It’s fine to designate an area in your barn for storage, but farm owners may want to consider constructing a separate building.
“Storage need is dictated by how many animals are going to be on your property,” said Lorri Hayward of Hayward Designs.
While many barn owners often resort to incorporating a loft into their barns for their storage needs, a loft can actually inhibit the ventilation and natural light that you want to promote in your building. Lofts, specifically lofts designed for hay storage, are also a fire hazard.
Tack Rooms
When it comes to a functional tack room, you can build too small, but you cannot build too big. Since the tack room is often the center of activity in the barn, how well it’s designed will, to an extent, determine how smoothly your barn operates. A tack room should be no smaller than 12’ x 12’, the size of an average stall.
You may want to consider incorporating 9-foot ceilings into your tack room so you can build storage shelves into the walls and hang vertical storage units for saddles or blankets. Other considerations are:
- Bridle hooks
- Hanging hooks for tack cleaning
- Saddle rack for tack cleaning
- Saddle racks for storage
- Blanket racks for storage
- Sink
- Small desk or office area for records
- Dresser or chest of drawers for storage
- Counter or table
- Cabinets
- Washer and dryer
- Refrigerator
- Tack trunks
- Smooth concrete floors or durable wood flooring that’s easy to clean
- Heat and/or air conditioning
A single tack room can also serve as a utility and feed room.
Utility Rooms
A utility room is another storage option that will free up space in your tack room. An organized utility room can double as a feed room. Unlike tack rooms, a 12’ x 12’ space is ample room to contain the items that may live in a utility room, such as a washer, dryer and hot water heater. Other considerations for a utility room:
- 9’ ceilings for added storage space
- Smooth concrete flooring that slopes to a drain for easy clean up (also can be incorporated in tack room)
- 4’ wide doorways
- Countertops or tables
- Double basin utility sink
- Cabinets for storage
- Work bench
- Refrigerator
- Heat and/or air conditioning
