Building a cat shelter: facades

Over the weekend I got back to working on the new cat house, in between planting trees, bee inspections, and other stuff.

This time, I built the facades at the top of the front wall, to help give it an old-west theme.

As you may recall, the structure is divided into two sides: the shelter on the left, and the feeding station on the right. So the facades reflect this, suggesting two separate (but joined) buildings, with a squared two-step facade on the shelter side, and a triangle facade on the feeder side.

Here are the back and sides:

Some interior framing added to the top:

Behind the facades is a metal roof-to-wall flashing, that will sit on top of the roofing shingles. The wall side was roughly cut with a reciprocating saw:

The rough edge of the flashing is hidden behind another layer of plywood:

Top 8×1 boards:

Front view with the top boards in place:

Like other parts of the structure, the facades can be removed, to make installation easier. It’ll be screwed into place. Here, I’m adding more bracing:

Added some corner trim:

Back view, showing trim under the top boards:

The entire front of the facades is a door that will hinge downward, to provide access to the cavity within, which will house wires and power supplies for the cameras and heating pads.

Here I added trim to the door:

The center of each facade will contain a custom sign purchased via Etsy; more on those in the future.

The door clamped in place:

A view of the whole structure:

Another angle:

The basic structure is now mostly complete; all that remains before it can be painted is some decorative trim work. There’s still a fair bit to do: painting, roofing, door hardware, some decorative touches, and more.

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