Avon Old Farms School was constructed in the 1920s to the designs of Theodate Pope Riddle, Connecticut’s first female licensed architect. The School is listed on the Connecticut State Register of Historic Places.

In organizing the construction of her school, Theodate Pope Riddle imported master craftsmen from the Cotswold region of England to serve as project foremen. They in turn trained and supervised the over 500 workmen who labored on site to create the school buildings. The campus was constructed of local materials using late 16th-century construction techniques. 

The forge building was one of the first buildings constructed in an assemblage of structures that included the forge and adjacent water tower, carpenter shop and wheelwright shop. This complex of buildings served a dual purpose as a “mock-up” of the techniques and aesthetic style for the entire campus and served as the fabrication center for all of the materials used on site. Over time powderpost beetles and water infiltration have caused the forge’s timber framing to deteriorate significantly and, the roof to drop several inches and pull away from one of the chimney stacks. 

The highly unusual construction of the School buildings – atypical for the United States – required careful and deliberate testing of methodologies. The School viewed the restoration of the forge as the first step in the sequential repair of the existing slate roofs and masonry walls of the entire historic campus.