Rustic Chicken Coop
Sharing our chicken coop with you that we designed on our own. After talking about a chicken coop for about a year, my husband sat down and drew this chicken coop, garden shed and squirrel dog kennel himself and I have to say, it’s quite beautiful. If you’re looking for chicken coop ideas, I hope this post will help answer some of your questions!
Read on to see more about our coop and some basic facts about what to consider when building your coop.
Repurpose Materials
Our chicken coop is made of many recycled pieces. Our beautiful, colorful wood came from an old building out of state that my parents purchased but never needed. The colors in it are just stunning. Some of the rusty tin you see was tin that was stacked up behind our home when we moved in. Our door and some beams were purchased from a man that collects old house doors and our window was another item that my parents didn’t need. Lastly, our bricks were free from someone who had them but had no use for them. If you’re building a chicken coop, I suggest posting on social media or searching for materials to recycle that may save you money in the long run. Sometimes old and rusty pieces add just the touch that you need!
We love the dutch door design on the coop part because this allows us to drop feed and scraps in easily without risking the chickens getting escaping if for some reason we’re not ready for them to head out for the day. It was a great design that my husband put in!
Coop measurements are 10x11
Consider Where to Store Supplies
Caring for chickens means you’ll have bags of feed, scratch or corn, shavings for the ground and more. You’ll need a safe, dry place to store these items away from animals and moisture. Tin trash cans with lids protect our feeds and keep bugs out.
I love that we created a walk in place to collect eggs and gather feed. This room also stores as a garden shed for our gardens that are out in front of our coop. We store most garden supplies in here as well as our dog food and dog supplies.
Garden shed measurements are approximately 10x9
Tips for building your chicken coop:
Search for recycled pieces. This can add lots of charm and history to your project and may save you money in the long run. With building materials higher than normal, it may be beneficial to look for old pieces that people will give away or sell for a lesser cost.
Consider how many chickens you want before you build. My husband was pretty set on having about a dozen chickens. We have been blessed to have our same dozen for over a year now, and because our coop is larger, we can still add some more.
Consider size. If you’re going to leave your chickens in the coop 24/7, you want to have about 3 square feet per chicken. If they will free range more often, a smaller coop for nighttime use is okay. Our chickens free range for a few hours during the day but now that we have a garden fence up, we plan to leave them out more (they love eating gardens!).
Consider your laying boxes and where you want them. We wanted our boxes to be easy to get to so they are located within the walk in garden shed. We also built ours with a roll down effect where the egg can roll down and not get as filthy. Nesting boxes can be built, purchased or even found at old antique and rummage sales.
Research chickens and types. This can determine how many eggs you may get per day on average and this may affect how many chickens you’ll want. Some chickens that people love to have simply for their looks or egg color may not lay as much. You want to account for all of these things.
Consider how to utilize space. Since you will already be working on this project, consider what else you need. In our case a garden shed and a dog kennel was something we needed and built into this project. You can easily add on something of this sort to accommodate your family and yard.
Consider if you want a chicken run. If you don’t have the space to let your chickens out or if you don’t want them free ranging all over your yard and home, consider adding a chicken run to your coop. This will need to be added into your design and will provide them a fenced and protected place to roam freely.
Our roosting pole is made out of scrap pieces of wood and is actually quite pretty to look at!
None of our items can be sourced here other than the door hinges and locks from Lowe’s and our weathervane that we purchased here. Our fencing and metal roof were purchased locally at local hardware stores. All of our other supplies was thrifted, recycled or given to us.
It’s a Labor of Love
I hope you have enjoyed seeing a peek into our beautiful coop. It was definitely a labor of love that my husband and children worked on while I rested with a new baby at the time. I just walked in and decorated it and have the best time dressing it up for the holidays. While there are some beautiful coops out there to purchase and I know that not everyone is capable of building something, it is wonderful to see your own creation and hard work. I love admiring (and showing off) the hard work that my husband (and kids) put into this. Our chickens have a beautiful place to rest and stay safe from predators and we have a place to serve multiple purposes.
I hope that you’ve found our coop post helpful!
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