A barn or other outbuilding can:
- Convey a setting for the events in the dream. In a dream where you're working in a barn, the barn could represent an actual barn, a real-life setting that you associate with a barn somehow, or barn-like qualities of a situation—such as hard work, farming, animals, storage, etc.
- Represent an aspect of your life or a role you play. In a dream where you're working in a barn, the barn might represent your workplace or a role you play which you associate with barn characteristics—pet owner, cultivator or creator, "muckraker" or "problem clean-up"