Herald garden studio

An all-singing, all-dancing,183 sq ft garden studio from Parsonson Architects in New Zealand for a family in Wellington, built as a garden office space, play space, and additional accommodation with a mezzanine area, deck, and bathroom. It's all wood, while the interior linings are zero formaldehyde ‘Strandboard’ finished in natural WOCA oil. 

Photographs: Paul McCredie (and more at the link above).

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More than half of people say working from home has improved their quality of life

There's a glut of surveys around about how working from home has changed our working lifestyles and I'm not goint to point to every single one, but this is a good, wideranging one from Uswitch showing:

* A quarter of home-workers are doing their job from bed or in their nightwear, and 40% from the sofa

* Two thirds of workers say they are just as productive or even more so

* More than half say working from home has improved their quality of life, with two fifths exercising more and a third eating more healthily

* Nearly two thirds (61%) have had issues with their broadband or mobile signal - 16% have missed a deadline and 13% lost a client as a result of bad connections. A further 9% have been on a conference call to a colleague or client that has cut out.

More recommended reading in The Economist ('Death of the office As the pandemic leaves offices around the world empty, Catherine Nixey asks what was the point of them anyway) and The Guardian ('Working from home has a long history').

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

New survey shows garden offices and working from home will be new 'normal'

A new survey from Cushman & Wakefield of more than 40,000 respondents worldwide in 30 companies across 20 industries shows that:

- 75% of people say they are collaborating effectively with colleagues in the current environment – up 10% from the pre-COVID-19 period
- 90% feel they are trusted to work remotely
- Almost three quarters of people would like their companies to embrace long-term or permanent flexible working policies
- Sub-par broadband connectivity is the biggest issue for respondents WFH

Overall, the findings reveal that work will shift from office-based to a total workplace ecosystem, balancing home, office and other locations. “It’s imperative to recognize that the workplace will no longer be a single location, but an ecosystem of a variety of locations and experiences to support flexibility, functionality and employee wellbeing,” said Brett White, CEO of Cushman & Wakefield.

You can download The Future of Workplace report at the link.

Image courtesy Modern Garden Rooms ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thursday posts are sponsored by Cabin Master: garden offices and studios to fit any size garden. Top quality contemporary or traditional buildings.

New Mayor of Bexley appointed in his garden office

Another fine example of what you can do in a garden office during lockdown.

Last Wednesday, I became the 57th @MayorOfBexley @LBofBexley - in our first ever Virtual #AnnualCouncil. There were no robes, no chains (sorry Paul), no vol-au-vonts and I took the oath of office from my garden office - #NewNormal? #Covid_19 #lockdown #bookshelf #DoItForBexley pic.twitter.com/eWQMZelbRh

— Cllr James Hunt (@cllrjameshunt) May 27, 2020

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Wednesday’s posts are sponsored by Norwegian Log Buildings  - Log cabins and garden buildings for a better quality of life. Click here for more details.

Lockdown shedworking in Ireland

It's been interesting how many people have started doing some kind of shedworking during the lockdown, but it has also thrown up how many people already work from garden offices. The Irish Times highlights four - a Wines Direct franchisee, an artist, a video editor, and a writer - and gives us a little tour. Here's a snippet:

"Una Sealy built her shed at the end of the garden 16 years ago, having worked in studios in Temple Bar and Henrietta Street [Dublin] over the years. “After I had children and moved out of the city centre, I started working from home. My studio is lovely,” she says. “It’s warm and bright, has running water and has room for my collection of art books. It’s separate from the house, so I can’t hear the doorbell or home phone and it has no internet, so the temptation isn’t there to zone out online.”

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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

ITV's Isolation Stories produced from a garden office

If you've been enjoying ITV's Isolation Stories mini-series which has been fast off the mark to document the current lockdown, then you'll be delighted to learn that it was directed by Zoom from the garden office of Phil Pope (pictured above).  -------------------------------------------------
Monday posts are sponsored by garden2office, the Swedish garden office specialists. Click here for more details.

Anthropods

Harrogate-based Anthropods - the brainchild of designer Rik Currie - may be the answer if you a) want something that looks rather different as a garden office and/or b) have uneven ground, since it's leg configuration system means you can set it up on really quite uneven ground. Pictured is the Bleriot model, though there are various other sizes available. Like all their pods, it uses recyclable materials where possible, with a red cedar cladding, either on- or off-grid features (with solar panels), and earth/chemical toilets. They are delivered on site using a flat-bed truck with a hi-ab crane. Once in place, it can be moved using a Manitou or a tractor with a fork telelifter. 

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Sunday posts are sponsored by eDEN Garden Rooms. Stunning, bespoke high quality garden rooms, to suit your unique space and style

YrPod Shelter garden office

Founded by Dan Pleszko, Bishops Stortford-based YrPod has a range of attractive models with curved roofs to fit any shedworking needs. Our favourite is The Shelter - there are four sizes available but this is the smallest we're showcasing here as we get so many requests for garden offices to fit into smaller gardens. It comes either ready-assembled or can be assembled on site in two days if there are access issues - standard features include LED lighting, plug sockets, full insulation, wooden framed windows and doors with double glazed/toughened glass. Optional extras include shower room, kitchenette, solar power system, and rainwater harvesting system.

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

Jack Monroe: shedworker

The excellent cook, food writer, and anti-poverty campaigner Jack Monroe has been busy turning herself into a shedworker, preparing for her new cookery series Jack Monroe's Camp Kitchen. She has essentially turned a rather dilapidated old shed into a marvellous working garden studio for around £100, using reclaimed items from her garage for decoration and furniture. We particularly liked the astroturf touch which you can just see in the photo above. This is what the shed looked like before...

And here's what she says about it:

"This shed/studio/shedio is probably one of the most radical acts of self care and self investment I have done in as long as I can remember. I can't recall being this genuinely comfortable and happy for a very long time. Going to be hanging out in here a lot, getting to know what makes me happy when I'm all by myself alone with nothing to prove."

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Thursday posts are sponsored by Cabin Master: garden offices and studios to fit any size garden. Top quality contemporary or traditional buildings.

Joanne Harris writing tutorials from her garden office

Novelist Joanne Harris, who works from a very impressive garden office, runs a regular slot on her Twitter page called Ten Tweets where she briefly discusses the said number of items concerning certain aspects of writing. It's excellent stuff and indeed she has just brought out a book called Ten Things About Writing which is well worth investigating.

She has also developed the idea into a series of ongoing shortish videos which you can find on her YouTube page here. Here she is below talking about getting to know your characters.

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Wednesday’s posts are sponsored by Norwegian Log Buildings  - Log cabins and garden buildings for a better quality of life. Click here for more details.

The virtual garden sheds of Chelsea Flower Show 2020

So in normal circumstances this would have been the first day that the public got in to have a nose around the marvellous Chelsea Flower Show. Things being what they are, there are obviously no display gardens, nor exhibitors areas where there are always plenty of sheddish structures. It would not have been a classic year for garden offices, but if it had gone ahead, here is what you could have (probably) seen starting above with Kazuyuki Ishihara's Zen garden for Glion with a garden house designed in collaboration with Kengo Kuma.

 

 

Designed by Jonathan Snow for Trailfinders with a focus on Nepal, the garden plan includes a timber shelter inspired by local architecture with a rather nice stone path and water-powered prayer wheels.

 

 

This looks like it would have been particularly lovely, a teahouse designed by Miaofu for its own garden. Here's what the RHS says about it: "The tearoom is a set to host a social gathering reminiscent of those held in ancient China. Friends will gather here in the traditional way to enjoy time together and in doing so slow their pace of life and spend time in nature."

 

 

This Nikki Tibbles garden, to have been built by The Outdoor Room and sponsored by Bicester Village Shopping Collection, doesn't have a shed as such but it does have a wooden pergola made from reclaiemd sea groyne which is described as "an enchanting space in which to escape, work, create and relax away from the hustle and bustle of life".

Finally, a sauna and cool-off in the Finnish Soul Garden, designed by Taina Suonio for the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry of Finland. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday posts are sponsored by Garden Spaces, suppliers of contemporary garden buildings, offices, gyms and studios, many of which do not require planning

Chelsea Garden Show: how we were in 2012

Chelsea Flower Show should have started today with its usual lovely spread of garden offices, shepherds' huts, and sheds. Tomorrow, we'll take a look at some of the sheddish-structures that visitors would have been able to see, but today here is a look back at what was on offer in 2012, starting above with Jo Thompson's lovely caravan-centred show garden which won a silver gilt.

There were plenty of people enjoying the Rooftop Workplace of Tomorrow garden which won silver.

Below is the shaded cabanon in the L'Occitane Immortelle Garden

And here is Plankbridge's shepherd's hut - the first ever to appear at Chelsea - in their own silver-winning garden. We stopped for a long chat with Richard from Plankbridge about its construction.

Vicky Harris’s stone crofter’s hut in her Naturally Dry garden
 

The Artisan Retreats area where five sturdy Malvern Collection summerhouses were turned into working spaces.

Nigel Dunnett’s RBD Blue Water Garden featured a lovely conical-roofed trullo, a traditional hut from Puglia.
 

And finally, the shepherd’s stone hut in Borut Benedejcic’s Pepa’s Story Artisan Garden.

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