Shed Mad Weekend

This weekend I built a small shed, purchased from B and Q in the UK. It's only a basic model, and will be used for storing my tools and mower, and also for blocking off a small corner of the garden at the side of the house. This portion is a little dark and contains the gate to the front of my house, the (hot and cold!) outside taps, hose pipes and micro irrigation hose connections, plus various garden odds and ends like stored timber and so on.

 The construction process was pretty straightforward, really, the only difficulty being adding the roof felt. The felt with which it came was a little on the cheap side, and I found that it tended to tear rather easily and made the job that bit trickier. With liberal use of felting tacks, though, I sorted it out and tidied it up fairly well.

I found also that it was useful to have a helper or two when screwing the sides together, just to hold things in place and enabling me to make sure that everything was square and solid. The most time consuming part of the entire thing was preparing the base and ground. I had to level out a very rocky area in dribs and drabs between rainy days, and then proceeded to lay out paving slabs for the shed base to sit on. It's common to use a full concrete base, especially for larger buildings, but I wanted to retain the flexibilty that comes with a removable or mobile footing - if I decide I want to move the whole thing to the left a bit, then I'll simply empty the shed, drag it onto the patio, relay the slabs, and move the shed back.

The next task on the list, probably for this coming weekend, will be to fit some shelves and hooks, and perhaps brace a couple of weaker spots. Then I'll fill it up beyond normal capacity so that nothing can ever be easily found or extracted, as is customary. Come spring it will need painting, then I will probably add a small lean-to structure on one side and re-felt the roof.

Care for your shed - it's not just for Christmas, you know.


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