How To Roof A Treehouse

Building the roof was one of the most challenging parts of this treehouse build.

How to roof a treehouse.

Add a simple roof to your treehouse. I have worked with tar and gravel shingles before but never wood. If your design calls for a flat roof try to introduce even a small slope of 3 5 so water cannot sit there. This roof is made from a simple tarp although you can also get more elaborate in designing and constructing your roof.

When your rafters are all on lay down the plywood for the roof an leave a good 2 and 1 2 space around the tree so it can sway in the wind without hitting the roof. Drive one hook into both trunks about 8 feet 2 4 m above the bottom of the platform. You should never use a flat roof for a treehouse. Allow a two inch gap around the tree if it passes through the floor and a three inch gap if it passes through the roof see photo.

Remember our walls are at 5 feet so we have a 2 rise a 6 12 pitch will give us a 26 5 degree slope on our roof. This was quite challenging because i had to figure out how to properly attach them as well as work from a high and dangerous height. Which would put the center of our roof right at 7 feet. For our hideaway we went simple and used a 6 12 pitch.

The first decision we made when it came to the roof was how tall you want your treehouse. To keep a large tree house stable center the load over the trunk and spread the weight among several branches. A properly sloped or pitched roof is much superior. Roof pitch can be a bit confusing but i will tell you how we did it and please know that you can modify to what suits your treehouse best.

How to level a treehouse floor. I used shingles cut in half to seal around the tree and shingled the rest of the roof like normal.