A lovely timber and brick studio in London from O'Sullivan Skoufoglou Architects (you can see lots more images of it by Rory Gaylor at the always excellent Dezeen) for a filmmaker and artist couple. Features include a bathroom, and large built-in desk, and exposed timber roof and brick structure.
I've been writing about Dylan Thomas's writing shed on and off since Shedworking started 20 years ago, but I've never seen these photographs before, taken by Welsh photojournalist Geoff Charles in 1955 on a visit to Laugharne.
These are held by the National Library of Wales, and show Charles's images of the exterior and interior of the writing shed, as well as his boathouse and other local spots, including his grave (large thanks to the NLW for its generous Creative Commons licence).
By a remarkable coincidence, I also stumbled upon photos taken around the same time by American photographer Rosalie Thorne McKenna of Thomas's shed which you can see at the Vassar website here (which has stiffer reproduction permissions). They are equally worth a look.
Taylor Swift was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame earlier this week and in her acceptance speech discussed the pivotal importance of a garden office music studio at an early stage in her career. Here is the relevant section:
"And then my most favorite was a place called Jody Williams Music, an independent publishing company that was located in the little craftsman house.
"And, you know, let's say the year is like 2005 in this memory. My mom would pick me up from Hendersonville High School, drive me downtown and drop me off and I'd scamper in the front of Jody Williams Music and I'd say hi to Katherine who worked at the front and sometimes her boyfriend Eric would be there visiting.
"Things have gone great for them. They've got a couple kids, married like 20 years now. His full name is Eric Church, just for clarity. But then I'd run up the stairs and I would plop down on the couch in front of Liz Rose in this room that was painted red.
"I'd say, 'Liz, this happened at school today. I've got a hook that I want to like, you know, we've got to write this thing.' And she'd get her notebook and we'd just write so fast.
"And when we finished with the song, you know, I'd kind of jog out the back of this house to the backyard where there was a garden shed. And in that garden shed was a one-person studio where Jody Williams Music's favorite demo producer, Nathan Chapman, was making demos.
"And I would run in, and Nathan would play every single instrument on these demos, and he interpreted my music so intuitively that later on I would fight for him to produce my entire first album."
Pic credit: Ronald Woan via Flickr
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I'm delighted to see that Blackwells as chosen my latest book The Philosophy of Sheds (published by the British Library) as one of its picks in its Best of Nature and Travel Writing 2026 list for its Books for Christmas section. It's also currently £1 off if you buy it from them. You can see the rest of the list here and it's available from all good booksellers, £1 off from Blackwells via the link above, or direct from the British Library.
As everything becomes ever more autumnal, an inspiring image of an Eden Garden Rooms build in Surrey next to a swimming pool. It is in fact a 6m x 3.5m garden gym with additional head room required for workout purposes. More details and pix at Eden's site here.
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This is one of the most common questions that brings people to Shedworking, so no apologies for returning to the subject. In fact it's an area recently addressed by Cabin Master who asked several estate agents in the Nottingham area for their thoughts. The takeaways were that:
- when similar properties are on the market, garden rooms can certainly raise the value
- a 5% uplift up to around £20,000 is realistic
- the value-added element is a percentage of the value of the whole property
- a properly-designed and fitted-out garden office with good insulation and electrical linkup is particularly valuable
- all this is only potential increase in value, there is no guarantee of an uplift
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Another splendid shepherd's hut build from Plankbridge, this time for their client Melanie in Devon (more mouthwatering pix at the link above) who was looking for something a bit nicer than the dilapidated corrugeated shed in a nice sunny space in her garden. Here's what Melanie says about it:
"I had been looking at shepherd’s huts because I liked the idea of a ‘den on wheels’. It’s a creative space for thinking and writing. One of my favourite meetings [with Plankbridge] was to discuss the finish of the sweet chestnut interior of my hut, the smell of the wax and encountering the enthusiasm of a true wood obsessive! Delivery through the stone wall entry to our field was nail-biting but they did it!"
Features include a bed and a handcrafted fold-down desk, to which Melanie has added an old sofa with an amber velvet back.
