For nearly half a century, a round barn in Grand Isle has served as subsidized low-income housing for seniors. Now, with plans to move that housing elsewhere, developers are trying to find a new purpose for the structure.
The 122-year-old barn building is showing its age, according to Jess Neubelt, a senior developer at Evernorth, a nonprofit developer that is working on the project with senior living provider Cathedral Square.
The Round Barn Apartments, as it’s called, has long needed repairs. But renovating such an old and unique structure would be too expensive, and maintaining housing there has become unsustainable, Neubelt said.
The developers are thinking of moving the roughly 12,500-square-foot barn to another property in Grand Isle.
Although it is listed in the state register, the barn building was found ineligible for the National Register of Historic Places after a review last year, according to Laura Trieschmann, Vermont’s historic preservation officer. Local residents fear that could lead to its demolition.
“Demolition is not our first choice here,” Neubelt said.
Evernorth and Cathedral Square plan to replace the barn’s 16 units of housing with a new two-story building on the same property. An annex that houses six additional units would undergo renovations. Wastewater capacity issues would prevent the developers from expanding the housing on site, but they plan to keep 22 units so that current residents can continue to stay there.
The barn is currently owned by a limited partnership that includes Evernorth and a Champlain Housing Trust-related entity. Evernorth and Cathedral Square will co-own the property after the redevelopment, and the latter will provide support services for seniors there, hopefully by spring 2027, according to Neubelt.
The barn was converted into housing before there were contemporary standards around insulation and weatherization. “So it’s not efficient in terms of space layout, it’s not efficient to heat and we don’t have air conditioning in that building,” Neubelt said.
“And of course, it’s not an accessible building, so having an elderly or 55 and older population is not ideal because when folks have a slip and fall or are otherwise injured or lose mobility, that’s not a good fit for them.”
There are structural issues — for instance, the central silo is leaning — and fire hazards to worry about as well, she said.
Neubelt presented Evernorth’s vision for the new building and renovation to the town’s selectboard in December, and the developers say they expect to submit a site plan to the town’s development review board soon.
Members of the Grand Isle Historical Society are also awaiting more information on the proposed project.
“Of course our society prefers preservation over demolition of the Round Barn,” wrote Jean Baker Prouty and Lucille Campbell in an emailed statement this week.
The organization is hosting a program to discuss the barn’s history at the Grand Isle Elementary School, 3 p.m. on Sunday. “Though questions have been raised about the future of the barn, this program will not include the Evernorth redevelopment proposal,” reads the notice Campbell shared.
A rare ‘American artifact’
In the meantime, John Hanou, a national round barn expert, has begun advocating for the preservation of what he refers to as the “Major Davis/E.J. Parker true-circular barn.”
Hanou, a resident of Maryland, maintains that the Grand Isle barn is unique for its pitched gambrel and slate roof (changed from original asbestos roof circa 1930) from that era — and is one of only two with an original gambrel roof remaining in North America.
Hanou and others in Grand Isle see this Vermont barn as a rare survivor and believe it should be preserved. The Davis Round Barn, Hanou wrote, is “an American artifact and a testament to historical agricultural vernacular architecture.”
According to Hanou, Vermont has lost 84% of its round and multi-sided barns over the years, with just 12 remaining, of which five are truly circular. “If Vermont loses this one, not only have they lost a real historic site, it’s lost the only one,” said Hanou, referring to the unique roof.
Unlike other round barns that are usually polygons, this one is “a rare true round barn,” he said.
Hanou’s book, ‘The Round and Multi-Sided Barns in Vermont, New Hampshire and Quebec. A History,’ details the history and unique structure of the Grand Isle barn, with historical photographs.
Round barns were fashionable at the time of its construction in 1903, he explained in an interview this week.
According to his research, the dairy barn was built by Major Alexander H. Davis who owned a large farm in Grand Isle, managed by Edward J. Parker. They were both prominent figures at the time. Davis made a fortune in the railway business; Parker was involved in many dairy farms and responsible for starting the Grand Isle grange, according to Hanou.
In 1902, the upcoming barn was quite the talk of the town, according to news clips cited by Hanou. During construction, the dairy barn was highlighted in a national agricultural newspaper as an 85-foot diameter round barn with a 20-foot central silo.
The state is still reviewing the Evernorth housing project for its impact on archaeology as part of its permitting. However, Trieschmann, Vermont’s preservation officer, said in an email Friday that the Vermont Advisory Council on Historic Preservation could re-evaluate the listing. She further noted that “designation to the State or National Registers does not protect a building from alterations, relocation, or demolition” and that that responsibility lies with the municipality and community.
Since Hanou’s posts on social media, concern has grown in Grand Isle about preserving the barn as well as the existing low-income senior housing.
“I have seen posts in various forums and heard concerns that this is being redeveloped into a market rate property — that’s not the case here,” Neubelt said. “This will be a permanently affordable community that hopefully is much more comfortable, much healthier, much more sustainable, both financially for us to operate, and environmentally, in the long term.”
“The key things here are that folks will not lose their housing, folks will come back to new and improved housing, and that our first choice is to be able to relocate the barn,” she said.
The developers are also focusing on minimizing disruption to residents so they will have to only move once, according to Neubelt.
The developers hope to finalize design and cost by the end of the year, begin construction in 2026 and complete the project in spring 2027.
Read the story on VTDigger here: In Grand Isle, concern circles the fate of a 122-year-old round barn.