An initiative to explore
outdoor learning spaces & experiences

1/4 Barn Build

2021 May Intensive
Barn Raising 1.0

A-Frame Structures

2022 May Intensive
Barn Raising 2.0

The BARN 3.0

2025 May Intensive
Barn Raising 3.0

About the project

Hidden in the woods of Hawken's Upper School campus is something remarkable—not an outdoor classroom built for students, but one imagined, designed, and constructed by them.

What began in the fall of 2020 as an ambitious idea has grown into a multi-year journey of design, perseverance, and community. Along winding trails and beneath the forest canopy, students and faculty have worked side by side to create a collection of outdoor learning spaces, including fire pits, gathering areas, and hand-built structures that invite exploration, creativity, and collaboration. Every project has been an opportunity to learn by doing, where sketches became blueprints, ideas became structures, and challenges became some of the most valuable lessons.

At the center of this vision stands the ¼ Barn—a student-designed, student-engineered, and student-built structure that represents far more than a building. It is the foundation of what we envision as Hawken's future center for outdoor education: a place where environmental science, architecture, engineering, art, storytelling, and performance naturally intersect. It can serve as a field biology station, sustainable design laboratory, outdoor classroom, studio, performance venue, retreat space, and gathering place for the entire Hawken community.

The path to building it was anything but straightforward. Early prototypes and previous construction efforts brought both successes and setbacks, each teaching lessons that informed the next attempt. Rather than seeing obstacles as failures, our students embraced the design process itself—iterating, refining, and improving with every challenge. Those experiences became as important as the finished structure.

In 2025, that journey culminated in Barn Raising, a semester-long interdisciplinary course that blended art, design, engineering, architecture, and English into one authentic learning experience. Students researched precedents, interviewed experts, developed architectural plans, created construction documents, managed logistics, sourced materials, and prepared every detail before a single board was lifted. When construction finally began, students, faculty, alumni, parents, and community members came together in the spirit of a traditional Amish barn raising, transforming months of planning into a lasting structure over just a few days.

Barn Raising is more than a building project. It is proof that when students are trusted with meaningful work, authentic responsibility, and the opportunity to create something larger than themselves, extraordinary things happen. The structures in these woods are not simply places to gather—they are lasting reminders that education is most powerful when students don't just study the world around them, but leave their mark on it.

Historical Circle W Barn

The Hawken Barn was truly a staple of Hawken's identity, as well as an integral part of the Hawken community. The barn was used from 1973 to 1977 (when it burned down) as part of Hawken's Animal Husbandry course. This was a yearlong course which, once signed up for, under no circumstances could be dropped. Students taking this course would have to feed, provide water, and maintain a clean environment for Hawken's 6 black Angus cows for the entirety of the year- 7 days a week, including vacations. Though a rigorous course, students loved it. It was a perfect example of Hawken's exemplary hands-on approach to learning. Tragedy would strike in 1977, though, when on a windy day what was once Ohio's largest dairy barn would catch fire. Students and teachers alike were in awe and could do nothing to stop the ginormous flames consuming the barn, taking with it an important part of Hawken's history and community. Though torn apart, the community came together to put out fires that had spread to Hawken's woods, preventing this catastrophic fire from claiming any more of the Hawken campus that they loved. The Hawken Barn was a historic piece of Hawken's history and belief system, which we must guarantee is not forgotten.

More about the Circle W. Barn

Contributing Courses

In addition to faculty, volunteers and family members, there are a number of students working on this project through several classes in the 2020-2022 school years.

2021 May Intensive - Barn Raising
2022 May Intensive - Barn Raising 2.o
2024-2025 Sustainable Design - Barn Raising 3.0

9th Grade Physics & Structures - (Fall Intensive)
Fab Play Studio - Projects (Fall Intensive)
Prototyping and Design (Spring Course)
Engineering Macro (Spring Course)
Barn Raising (Spring Intensive)
Hawken Senior Project (Spring)
Fab Lab Interns
Stage Craft (Spring)
Outdoor Leadership

Support

The initiative has benefitted from a lead gift from the Schneider family, which has allowed us to study a range of options for the space (from a central large structure to a decentralized educational “village”) and to weather the fluctuations in building material prices. But the project is a long term one and needs a sustainable source of funding to reach its potential. Teachers and students imagine improved trail systems, a canopy walk, and the ability to build and maintain enough shelter to host multiple classes along the creek and in the field. We see the Hawken experience shifting from classes in a building surrounded by fields, streams and woods, to an education that includes circles around campfires, birding under the big beech trees, long discussions on long walks on the trails, and a sense of belonging to the wild and beautiful land we walk in. To date, over 100 students have touched this project in one way or another. With support, such experiences could become a standard part of every student’s time at Hawken.