Global surge for shepherds' huts

Blackdown Shepherd Huts have confirmed what we already suspected, that 2014 could be the year of the shepherd's hut. The Somerset-based Blackdown say they will head into 2014 with a 200% booking increase for its luxury, hand-crafted, pre-built huts and self-build, flat-pack, hut kits.

It's certainly been a good year for Blackdown as their Australian operation is now placing its huts in hotel chains, mining operations, healing retreats and vineyard wineries, while on this side of the globe its self-build hut kits have been shipped to Scandinavia, Portugal, Ireland and the Channel Islands.

George Bannister, Blackdown co-founder, said: "2013 has been a great year. We've seen a flood of orders come in from the UK, Australia and around the world. Demand has been so great, we've increased our range of self-build and pre-built hut options and thanks to our growing staff-base are creating a talented employment hub for traditional Somerset skills blended with cutting-edge Blackdown innovation. A 19th century shepherd would never have imagined the luxurious grandeur of a modern shepherd’s hut, with its bespoke electrical and plumbing systems."

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Starry starry shed

Kicking off our annual look at festive shedworking atmospheres, here's a Swedish mini Sportskabin in Hackney, complete with illuminated star. Garden2office installed the studio for the editor of BBC's The House that £100k built and it features underfloor heating, a built in 5:1 sound system, concealed wiring for a 75in TV, mini garden store and sliding folding doors. And a nice star. -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday posts are sponsored by garden2office, the Swedish garden office specialists. Click here for more details.

Shedworking wants your festive sheds

Every year we do a roundup or two of snowy sheds and decorated garden offices. If you're giving your shedlike atmosphere some Christmas sparkle, please do email us a photo.
Photo courtesy The Gingerbread House, based in the ancestral homelands of our staff and who specialise in mail order delicious, hand-baked gourmet gingerbread kits. ----------------------------------------------------------

Friday posts are sponsored by Warwick Buildings, manufacturers of outstanding quality timber buildings. Click here for more information.

Shepherds' Huts & Living Vans by David Morris

I've not seen a fully copy of this yet but the few pages I've seen look tremendous and I hope to bring you a review next week. David was in Bath last week launching the book and on Saturday he'll be at the Castle Garden Centre, Sherborne, Dorset, with a Plankbridge hut. In the meantime, he has been kind enough to write about his hut experiences for Shedworking's readers:

I guess my association with sheds goes back a long way. Growing up in Somerset on what was the remains of my great uncle's farm (then owned by my mother and father) we had sheds everywhere (bliss). Thanks to my parents' encouraging nature I was allowed to convert an old stable building into a very rudimentary sort of museum shed, collecting all kinds of rural bygones and stuff – effectively I had a shed and a rough museum at the age of 12 (how lucky we were).

The shepherds huts came about 10 years ago. My interest in rural history has never left me and my wife came across an abandoned hut on a Dorset track way. Not any old hut, this was the last hut used at Waterston Manor, and as a Dorset Tour Guide, she instantly recognised the appeal and importance of the hut. We rescued it back to our orchard and then carefully restored it.

Restoration. Now there is an interesting word. I am passionate about keeping as much original material as possible when something is being worked on or repaired. Quite often an object is stripped, polished, painted and re-adorned with countless new components and called a restoration? Rebuilt, refinished, repainted maybe, but not always what I would like to see in a restoration. The Hardy hut as we affectionately call it (Hardy probably never saw the hut, but you know how these things attract a name) has been very sympathetically restored keeping as much original material as possible.

My museum conservation skills have brought a lot of techniques and modern potions into play on the hut and enabled us to preserve original tin and timber that many people would probably have discarded thinking it was not saveable. You can’t save everything, but you can save more than you might think, for a lot longer than you would think, and I think that is important.

Hut two came a couple of years later, again found abandoned in a Dorset farm yard. I suppose this is where the book idea came from. I was beginning to write more in my museum curatorial position and was also reading more and more articles on shepherds’ huts that were not accurate. There was also a common trend beginning to form that everything with a curved tin roof and a wheel nailed to each corner was ‘a shepherds’ hut’. This was becoming frustrating and several people (notably my wife and several close friend rural life museum curators) encouraged me to get on and write the book, so I guess it all fell out of that.

I had been collecting hut related stuff for some years, had some background knowledge from my farming days, knew and had met people that had used shepherds huts, so I suppose I had a head start. I also know, and have access to, a lot or archives and collections that has undoubtedly helped find a lot of interesting early material. The book (I hope) gives and insight into shepherds’ huts and also clarifies the difference between these and other similar huts (road roller huts, steam threshing crew huts, etc) describing not only how they differ in design, but also how they were used by their occupants on a daily basis.

We all enjoy our huts today (mostly recreationally) but I think it is important not to forget that these were once people's real workplaces and often operating in very tough conditions on the knife edge of financial success or failure. I think some people may also be fascinated to see some of the very early references to shepherds huts that I have been able to research, particularly the illuminated manuscript images from the 1400s. 

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Cardboard shedworking

An interesting article on Wired looks at the Danbocchi Personal Soundproof Cardboard Studio which, as it is made out of cardboard (albeit reinforced), is probably best for interior shedworking. Not only handy, it also reduces noise levels by 30 decibels in case you start shouting at your laptop. Features include ventilation, a table and a cable hole. One drawback is its size - 3.6ft x 2.6ft x 5.4ft). Another for some would be that it's self-assembly with instructions in Japanese. Wired are reporting that it's sold out at the moment although Japan Trend Shop has some at a hefty markup, roughly double the origianl $580 price. -----------------------------------------------------

Wednesday posts are sponsored by The Stable Company®, the UK's premier supplier of garden offices and garden rooms. Click here

Sixth annual Brighton beach hut advent calendar

The fine folk at Beyond Church in Brighton are once again putting on their excellent beach hut advent calendar during December. We've reported on this since the very start (and one year on a daily basis in conjunction with The Independent newspaper which was frankly a bit exhausting) so we're delighted to see them still going strong. 

This year, the theme is the 'Alphabet of Advent'  (except X and Z) up to Y for Yuletide on Christmas Eve, on the seafront in a different beach hut every night from 5.30pm to 6.30pm.  Pictured above is last night's hut - B for Brighton & Hove - put together by local artist Nick Sayers via imagery collected by his pinhole cameras around the area over the last six months. We'll be reporting back again for occasional visits later this month...

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Tuesday posts are sponsored by Garden Spaces, suppliers of contemporary garden buildings, offices, gyms and studios, many of which do not require planning

Underwater shedworking

OK, so the Underwater Room at The Manta Resort near Pemba Island, Tanzania, may not technically be a garden office, but we salute its shedlike atmosphere and especially its bedroom which is four metres below the surface, a fabulous alternative workplace.
Via and my school latin master Robin Peach -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday posts are sponsored by garden2office, the Swedish garden office specialists. Click here for more details.

Thatched 'Tudor' shedworking for children

For just £6,500, this '1 bedroom detached house' in Shrivenham could be yours. Or at least your child's, as it's a thatched Wendy House, fully furnished (two beds, armchairs, grandfather clock, etc), with the potential to be connected to mains water and electric. According to the particulars, "The Wendy House is only suitable for small children as it has very restricted headroom, but it is possible for an adult to squeeze inside when crouched down." -----------------------------------------------------

Wednesday posts are sponsored by The Stable Company®, the UK's premier supplier of garden offices and garden rooms. Click here

The Brokedown Palace

A perfect post with Christmas coming up, the Brokedown Palace is an online shop selling worldwide from its shedquarters, a wooden cabin on the bank of the River Lea in Hackney Wick, London. Here's what they say about it all:

Everything we stock is inspired by cabin lifestyle, from essential survival kit to décor and clothes. This doesn’t mean it’s only for cabins – we believe you can bring a bit of cabin spirit into any part of your life. Cabin life is about being close to nature and this informs everything we do. 

If you're an ethical shopper, this is very much for you - items are made from, and packaged up in, ecologically friendly materials made in fair labour conditions, and the shop positively supports small businesses and traditional crafts. Indeed, stock is kept in a secure storage unit powered by 100% renewable energy sources.

In terms of shedworking, the cabin is made from FSC accredited slow grown Swedish pine, while the interior is made from reclaimed floorboards from a demolished Edwardian factory. The roof is made from recycled tyres and cardboard. The decking area is made from reused oak sleepers.

And last week they opened a store at the Boxpark pop-up mall in Shoreditch, a shopping mall made entirely of old shipping containers. They are in Unit 24 (see below).

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Monday posts are sponsored by garden2office, the Swedish garden office specialists. Click here for more details.