why are barns red?

Answer 1

Why are barns usually painted red?

If you've ever driven through a rural area, it's likely that you've seen the red barns that speckle the farming landscape. There are several theories as to why barns are painted red.
Centuries ago, European farmers would seal the wood on their barns with an oil, often linseed oil -- a tawny-colored oil derived from the seed of the flax plant. They would paint their barns with a linseed-oil mixture, often consisting of additions such as milk and lime. The combination produced a long-lasting paint that dried and hardened quickly. (Today, linseed oil is sold in most home-improvement stores as a wood sealant.) Now, where does the red come from?

In historically accurate terms, "barn red" is not the bright, fire-engine red that we often see today, but more of a burnt-orange red. As to how the oil mixture became traditionally red, there are two predominant theories:

Wealthy farmers added blood from a recent slaughter to the oil mixture. As the paint dried, it turned from a bright red to a darker, burnt red.
Farmers added ferrous oxide, otherwise known as rust, to the oil mixture. Rust was plentiful on farms and is a poison to many fungi, including mold and moss, which were known to grown on barns. These fungi would trap moisture in the wood, increasing decay.
Regardless of how the farmer tinted his paint, having a red barn became a fashionable thing. They were a sharp contrast to the traditional white farmhouse.
As European settlers crossed over to America, they brought with them the tradition of red barns. In the mid to late 1800s, as paints began to be produced with chemical pigments, red paint was the most inexpensive to buy. Red was the color of favor until whitewash became cheaper, at which point white barns began to spring up.

Today, the color of barns can vary, often depending on what they are used for.

Answer 2

Barns are red because the surrounding countryside is green. Red and green are compliments, which means that the scene would be a very pleasant one, because of the balance of color. This may not have been a conscious thing, but I would imagine people liked red barns, and painted them that color without knowing why they liked them.

Also red stands out, you won't mistake a barn for a house or a church. It helps identify the farms.

Answer 3

The simple answer to why barns are painted red is because red paint is cheap. The cheapest paint there is, in fact. But the reason it’s so cheap? Well, that’s the interesting part.

Red ochre—Fe2O3—is a simple compound of iron and oxygen that absorbs yellow, green and blue light and appears red. It’s what makes red paint red. It’s really cheap because it’s really plentiful.

Answer 4

Because they need painting and in the old days red was the only cheap, reliable paint/pigment that would not fade over time making the barn look shabby.

btw some barns have the same type of earth pigment in the paint but are ocre or other earth type color. Red just became the tradition.

Answer 5

I have that issue of GRIT as well.. :-)

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Lewis Evans wrote in 1753, “It is pretty to behold our back settlements where barns are as large as palaces, while owners live in log huts, a sign of thrifty framing.” Strength and convenience were regarded as the most essential requisites in early American barns. European barns had been small, but early settlers built huge barns, symbols of expansive hopes and plans for life in the New World.

Farmhouses changed with trends in fashion from 1650 to 1850, but barns did not vary. Barn design, a standard symbol for the American farmer, remained a dignified hand-hewn structure with the same scrollwork that, in the late 1850s, decorated the farmer’s house.

In American Barns and Covered Bridges (Dover Publications, 2003), Eric Sloane points out that weather was always an important consideration in planning a barn. The early builder mapped routes of sunshine, wind and water drainage. He paid careful attention to the health and comfort of his animals, as well as to the protection and preservation of barn timbers and stored grain.

Early 18th-century bridges and barns went unpainted. The right wood in the right place, it was discovered, needed no paint. Even houses in the earliest settlements were not painted. To paint the barn would have been viewed not only as extravagant, but vulgar and showy.

Red catches on
However, by the late 1700s, the art of wood seasoning gave way to the art of artificial preservation. Virginia farmers were the first to become paint-conscious. In Pennsylvania, the Dutch settlements latched on to the custom of red bricks, red barns, red geraniums, even reddish-brown cows. When a Pennsylvania Dutch farmer added big ornamental designs to barns, “just for luck,” he was accused of designing a hex sign to frighten the devil. Many old-timers sneered at their neighbors’ newly painted barns and accused them of copying “those superstitious Germans of Pennsylvania.”

But color caught on. Inasmuch as ready-made paint was not available, a farmer mixed his own. He discovered that skimmed milk, lime and red iron oxide made a plastic-like coating that hardened quickly and lasted for years. Occasionally, it hardened too well and peeled off in sheets. Linseed oil was subsequently added to the recipe to provide the necessary soaking quality. Thus American “barn red” was born. It came into being through function and utility, rather than decor or superstition. It was soon discovered that the red barn color was warmer in winter since it absorbed the sun’s rays.

In the mid-19th century, skimmed milk was used in mixing paint.

The belief that barn red originated with American Indians actually has some foundation. Records indicate that, in accordance with an old American Indian custom, farm stock blood was indeed mixed with milk and used for staining interior surfaces. A pigment called “Indian Red” was made from clay mixed with whites of wild turkey eggs. Turkey blood was added to provide a deep mahogany shade. Stains using blood were not, however, suitable for outdoor use.

Red has remained the traditional color for most American barns, particularly in the Northeastern and Midwestern United States. We can thank our ingenious colonial forebears for this visually appealing, colorful heritage.


Catherine Lazers Bauer lives in Morrison, Colorado, and has had 650 essays, articles and stories published in national, regional and literary markets.

Answer 6

so they stand out, and arnt mistaken for a house.

Answer 7

because they want to be red, duhhh