Cedar siding
For me, nothing beats real cedar siding when it comes to cottage buildings, but there are less expensive alternatives. Prefinished wood siding eliminates tedious painting or staining (at least, for a few years) and sheet-based siding products are looking better all the time. If you can, purchase lengths of siding long enough to span the width and length of the building to eliminate any vertical seams.
You may want to go ahead and install your windows and doors first, then your siding, since it can be easier that way. I installed my siding first because of the timing of the materials and the help I had on hand.
I made sure to open up several bundles of cedar siding at a time and mix them up as I installed the pieces. This eliminated sections of lighter or darker siding, which would create unsightly patches. I used siding nails driven at an angle through the tongues, experimenting with the best nail location to have them high enough to be hidden by the grooves on the adjacent piece but low enough not to split the tongue or interfere with the interlocking tongue-and-groove. I worked from the bottom to the top, checking every few courses for level. I allowed the siding to run long past the corners, and trimmed it off after all the siding was installed on each wall.
Once all the siding was on, I closed in the space under the eaves with lengths of cedar ripped to width, then capped the corners with vertical pieces to hide the cut edges of the siding and seal out the weather.
Windows and doors
I chose off-the-shelf vinyl windows because they're zero maintenance. While these don't look as nice as wood-frame windows, they do have an integral brick mould that makes installing them a snap—I just had to lay a bead of polyurethane sealant on the back edge of the brick mould and insert the window. Then I shimmed it level and drove a few screws though each frame into the studs below.
I did make the cedar awning-style windows that grace each gable end, however. These are cedar frames, rabbetted to accept a pane of glass held in place with glazing tape and retaining strips. I installed these windows into a simple cedar frame with hinges at the top so that the window swings out, then added a sash lock at the bottom to secure the window shut. A scrap of wood serves as a window prop.
The front door was from the demolished building, and its tiny window offered little light. To rescue the cabin from darkness, I added sidelights on each side of the door. I built these sidelights myself. I framed the narrow window openings when building the wall and added a one-inch cedar frame all the way around. I nailed a stop close to the outside edge of the window the frame. I used glazing tape on the inside face of the stop, followed by a sheet of tempered glass held in place with another stop on the inside. The tempered glass was required by local building code: the sidelights are close to the ground, and may get broken.
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