Not an exterior colour you see very often on a garden office or studio, but the Shedworking staff rather like this lime green stain pictured top from Phoenix Garden Buildings, one from their Richmond model range.
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Devon-based Astrid Arnold, managing director and lead carpenter of TouchWood South West, has won the Screwfix Top Tradesperson 2023 competition, taking home £10,000 worth of tools, £5,000 worth of technology and £5,000 towards future training which she will use to further existing training programmes that her company currently runs for disadvantaged women in her local community.
According to Screwfix: "Astrid was a stand-out winner, with her incredibly technical and stunning carpentry work, her focus on sustainability within her business, as well as her passion for supporting women with trade skills."
Among her highlighted projects was the studio cabin pictured above. Here's what she says about it:
"The aim of this project was to build a cabin that could provide an extra outside room, feel spacious inside, used environmentally friendly materials and was well insulated. We also dismantled the old cabin that was already there, reused as much timber from it as possible in the new cabin and built a 3-bay garden compost bin with the rest. We used eco-friendly internal and external wood fibre insulation, which minimises cold-bridging, making the cabin very well insulated. The doors and windows are aluminium framed, which is the most durable option for the Devon weather! Externally the cabin has larch shiplap cladding, painted charcoal black with external Osmo wax-oil. The internal floor is made from reclaimed pine timber boards, oiled with interior Osmo white."
https://www.touchwoodsouthwest.com
My latest book is out now, The Book Lover's Almanac and naturally there are numerous garden offices and shedlike atmospheres included inside. Among those authors whose writing huts get an entry are Virginia Woolf, George Bernard Shaw, John Steinbeck, Arthur Conan Doyle, and John Masefield, plus the Lausanne summerhouse where Edward Gibbon completed The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
Available wherever good books are sold including Blackwells and your local independent bookseller.
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An excellent idea this, Sigma Homes Group is offering a garden office option at its new Hanlye View Development on conjunction with Bakers Garden Buildings. Pictured above at the new homes site in the mid-Sussex village of Cuckfield is the bespoke 10 sqm garden office. Prices for a three-bedroom house start at £680,000. Here's what Sigma say about it:
The garden has been designed to show prospective buyers how they can create an outdoor space sustainably to compliment the natural world whilst also being a functional space for families to spend time. It features a flowing gravel path which has been sourced from a local supplier and quarry to minimise the carbon-footprint. This leads to enclosed seating spaces, feature trees and the garden room... Provided by locally based Bakers Garden Buildings, this features the important working from home space.
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Another beautiful design from shepherd's hut specialist's Plankbridge. This bespoke, shingle-clad hut is at Elmley Nature Reserve where it fits right in to the landscape.
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A survey of 500 businesses by flexible workspace specialist IWG indicates that 82 per cent of businesses are adapting their approach to office space as a result of the hybrid working juggernaut. Indeed, around 54 per cent now run offices or co-working spaces outside main city centres, and just over a third have second locations in commuter towns as staff are now demanding more flexible working schedules.
The same study shows that almost three quarters of businesses have saved money by reducing office space costs and another third are paying fewer staff travel expenses, as people turn to garden offices and other similar third space alternatives.
“It’s clear that the old ways of working, with a daily unproductive and expensive commute, are long gone," said Mark Dixon, chief executive of IWG. "Businesses are realising that not only does hybrid working make sense for their bottom lines, it also benefits their workforces. It’s encouraging to see that businesses are translating their hybrid working savings into real benefits for employees. Not only does this help in the immediate term, with improved productivity and wellbeing, but it will also help them retain and recruit the best talent.”
This follows his comment last year that people were understandably questioning the need to commute two hours a day simply to use a laptop.
Image courtesy Cabinmaster
