Building your own garden studio!

[Barke02]

Hello Planeteers!

I thought I'd share with you the experiences of building my own studio space at the end of my garden. I've seen previous threads here, and threads on the Timelines forum, showing people's studio set-up and work areas. Well, here's mine!

Once 'family planning' kicked in I knew that the days of modelling 'indoors' were numbered! Living in the most overly populated and expensive part of of England (the south east) meant that we couldn't afford much in terms of bricks and mortar, I set-forth my masterplan to build the perfect outdoor studio!

Here's the first phots showing the laying of the armoured cable (looking a bit like trenches on the Somme!)

 

[Barke02]

To skirt planning permission I positioned it where there had been an existing structure (a shed!), and kept it under the maximum cubic metreage.

Here we are preparing and laying the base....

 

[housecarl]

A man in his shed. Quality.
Carl.

 

[kansas kid]

Hey Jonathan:

Very interesting. . . hopefully, you'll continue the WIP photo essay
in Rochester. . . I was glad to learn from your "text" that you're not
in the city in New York State, in the USA. And with a nod to
Stephen Sondheim, I was also thinking if your first name
was Benjamin instead of Jonathan, I could tell Broadway Buffs
that I've converse with the Deamon Barber of Fleet Street!



Let's see more. . . .

Jayhawker

 

[megroot]

Looking good Jonathan.
Has Hardy Tempest not a shed???
Hope you keep us informed....

Marc

 

[mil-mart]

Jon, interesting thread ,I look forward to following and hope that the weather holds over the weekend.

Cheers Ken

 

[1969]

Jon its good to see these images of your work on creating your own space for working, looks like your off to a good start with it and one thing you will need is that electricity supply to it for heating in the colder months from November through to well....November.

I sterted something similar last year, structures up but interior needs finishing and then i may move my stuff in, im on the kitchen table at the moment which has its drawbacks.

Look forward to seeing more of this project and hope the bank holiday holds out for you to make some progress.

Steve

 

[flart1943]

Hi Barke02
Steve is right heating in the Winter is essential, but also,from experience, something to cool you down in the hot Summer months.
Pete

 

[Barke02]

Steve, I forgot to say this is a retrospective....the studio is now finished! Just as well, it wasn't a good start to the bank holiday down here! (rain again).

Total spent when I was at this point: 100 feet of armoured cable £70, cement, sand, ballast and steel mesh £150.

I had borrowed a cement mixer, but it broke down halfway through pouring the base........a quick dash to the diy store to buy a new one cost £200!

 

[Barke02]

Dimensions for the build were 11 feet by 7.5 feet, not particularly big, but big enough for one modeller!

I started out with some really fanciful designs, and then tailored it to what was practical and what I could afford. The original design was a Mediterranean villa with a rooftop terrace and seating! Once I realized this would cost too much I downsized to a period out-building using reclaimed Victorian bricks and a Kent peg tile roof. Once I realized that that was also out of my price range i settled for good old concrete breeze blocks!

Here's the first blocks being laid...........

 

[Barke02]

Oh, and yes that is an original Anderson shelter on the left that my neighbour has, a memento from the blitz! It couldn't be half buried like it was suppose to as you'd hit solid chalk after 18 inches!

 

[Barke02]

Next came the positioning of the door and windows. These were the very first things that were bought for the project, as they would decide the shape of the design. I spent a couple of months searching ebay for the right ones to come up. I paid about £45 for the door and both windows (80's style double glazing with hardwood frames) then wrapped them up for the winter while I played around with the designs.

 

[Barke02]

A family friend who works for a building company supplied me with enough wood offcuts for my father to assemble the roof trusses. Once these were on site they went up quickly. I'm sure that any builders amongst you will say that it's a bit over-engineered, but as amateurs we were playing it safe.

 

[megroot]

That is gonna be a great one man's hobbyshack.

marc

 

[1969]

Bloody hell mate are you going to living in it , nice job so far and i think you are going to be spending many hours in there.

Steve

 

[chippy]

I hope your going to put a waterproof rendering on the outside and thermal linning on the in side or you will find it damp and cold in the winter months , but it's looking like the place we all should have .
chippy

 

[Barke02]

Steve, it's funny you should say that.....I've joked about putting a camp bed in there to get away from all the women! (even the pet cat's a girl!)

Chippy, good recommendations....and ones that were heeded!

The tiles came from another family friend who just happened to have in excess of a hundred concrete tiles sitting in his back garden! Total cost,...one crate of beer! All I had to buy was the ridge tiles.

The last photo shows the whole studio being rendered waterproof with PVA solution.

 

[Barke02]

I've never been a big fan of breeze blocks, I think they look pretty ugly, so the plan was to render the exterior and paint it. I wanted it to blend in with the garden, to camouflage it a little, but stopped short of 'oak-leaf' or 'splinter' and settled for plain old green!

Once the windows and door were slotted into place I really felt homely!

 

[Barke02]

Here you can see the initial insulation of the interior. The floor and ceiling were lined with 50mm of polystyrene, the walls 25mm. The battening also had to correspond with where I intended to put the work surface, cupboards, wiring, etc...

 

[Barke02]

These photos show the first bit of boarding out using 3mm MDF. At the bottom of the first photo you can see where the armoured cable comes into the studio.