My husband and I made this gate. We’d needed a new gate for years, our old one was falling apart, the hinges we barely hanging on, and we’d thought it had had enough of our Midwest winters and that we wouldn’t get through the next one. Having one huge project in one summer is a lot on anyone’s plate, let alone two! We’d built the new garden at the beginning of the season, and this gate was finishing out the summer. I won’t go into all the details about what we’d done, but feel free to ask me any specific questions in the comments!

Getting the 12′ posts set was one of the hardest things on this project, primarily because we had to take out the old posts. What a bear!

After building the gate frame for both sides and fence pickets sandwiched in the middle, my husband installed the insert. There’s a template, but it’s a little confusing, and it asked for a 9/16″ drill bit, which is odd. Just ask for 1/2″! Still, that’s the size you need… ; )

The pergola for the top was actually easier than it looks, but there is a lot of measuring and cutting. We wanted to keep the end cuts simple. Easy for me, because I didn’t get up on the ladder. Thankful the Mr. had no problem with it!

We decided to only replace the fence on one side…

And, to have a ninebark on the other side, between the post and the house. From a design perspective, I wanted a softer edge instead of a fence on both sides of the gate. With such heavy wood taking up two thirds of the space, we needed something to give the eye a rest, and to incorporate the structure into the yard. We didn’t want it to look like a fortress! ; )

Our house number is the next project, stained glass mosaic. You can bet I’ll be posting those pix too!