Wi-fi in the garden office

Certainly in the top 5 of regular queries to Shedworking from readers is the issue of getting wi-fi working efficiently in the garden office. Here's another suggestion, this time from Pocket-lint about the way to go, Google's Nest Wifi mesh system. It's well worth reading the whole article via the link above, but here's a snippet:

Without Nest Wifi, the Wi-Fi signal in our garden office (15 metres from the house and around 25-metres from our main router) was non-existent. When we set up Nest Wifi and put the Nest Wifi point in the utility room at the back of the house (two rooms away from the Nest Wifi router) however, we got full signal in the office. The speed test was a few Mbps slower in the office (67Mbps) than when the Nest Wifi point was upstairs on the landing (73Mbps) but this difference wasn't noticeable in use.

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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.

What are SIPs?

What is your garden office built out of? Increasingly, the likelihood is that it will be put together using SIPs (Structural Insulated Panels) but it's also quite likely that you're not entirely sure what these are. Here's a nice short video from Swift Garden Rooms to explain.

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Charles Schulz: shedworker

Charles Schulz, the creator of the Peanuts cartoons, was a very happy shedworker. His Californian art studio in Sonoma County, rural Sebastopol (pictured above) was where he documented the lives of Charlie Brown, Snoopy, et al, working from around 8.30am in the morning after driving his children to school, until about 4pm every day. He stayed there for lunch, usually a ham sandwich and a glass of milk, surrounded by the peaceful woods of the 28-acre propertly. You can see more interior shots at Press Democrat. The spacious studio has been largely left untouched but the owners have added a bed and rent it out to guests.

A recreation of his studio is on permanent display at the Charles Schultz Museum in the state's Santa Rosa. Among items on display are the drawing board he used to work on, his desk and shelves stacked with his own books, gifts, photos, and memorabilia.

In 1966, the original art studio was gutted in a fire. Schulz made use of the event in a story about Snoopy's doghouse also being destroyed by flames that year. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Garden office designed for customer with mobility issues

This bespoke garden office in Box Hill, Corsham, is from Swift Garden Rooms. It measures 5m x 3m and in addition to the black cladding and comprehensive insulation, has a multipurpose internal space which has been designed specifically for theclient's needs. As mobility issues are a key issue in this build, it has been designed with future-proof elements such as three leaf sliding doors with an ultra-low threshold. Swift's engineers/designers also incorporated additional internal wall strength to accommodate anchor points for specialised therapeutic exercise equipment.

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Traditional offices could be obsolete by 2030, says new report

An interesting report from integrated web applications specialists Zapier in the US suggests that the writing is on the wall for 'traditional' offices. In their latest study, around three-quarters of knowledge workers said they would be keen to leave a job which didn't permit working from home and jump to on that did, more than 40% said working from home was more productive than being in a 'normal' office (just under a third), and two-thirds of those questioned believe that the current idea of an 'office' will becom obsolete by 2030 for most roles.

They were also asked why they wanted to work from home and here are the top reasons:

1. Save money — 48%
2. Work from anywhere — 47%
3. Spend more time with their family — 44%
4. More productive at home — 35%
5. Better for their mental health. — 29%
6. It’s more environmentally sustainable — 23%
7. Spend more time with pets — 18%
8. Relocate somewhere more affordable – 16%
9. Make it easier when they start a family - 16%
10. Care for aging parents – 16%

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The secret life of sheds

A nice little piece in the FT by Emily Rhodes takes a look at the rise of rather luxurious bespoke garden offices. Here's a snippet:

"The desire for “secret space” — in the form of a bespoke, contemporary and spacious garden shed — is driving an entire architectural trend. “The sense of separation is really important,” says Jonathan Silver, an architect whose Pavilion, an “undeniably modern” shed structure, sits in the garden of his own west London flat. “You really get away; you can shut the door.”"

Well worth a read (via the link above) and you will see some builds featured previously on Shedworking with some chit chat from their owners and designers. ------------------------------------------------------

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Roald Dahl's writing shed: Miss Spider and the Hut

Here's a view of Roald Dahl's writing hut that many people will not have seen, as imagined by Ralph Steadman in the book The Roald Dahl Treasury, in ink, watercolour and acrylic with a photographic collage centrepiece. In Miss Spider and the Hut, Steadman portrays the first creature that James (of Giant Peach fame) meets on his adventures, here in mushroom fields looming above the writer's shed. Steadman said of the shed: "The room reminded me of an aeroplane cockpit. This was his creative space capsule inside which his imagination blossomed with wild, mischievous ideas."

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