When you have a bit of land, a cabin or garden shed seems essential. You can store tools in it or make it a playhouse for the children. It is even possible to create a small outbuilding to sleep there occasionally or even a pool house
Summary
A simple garden shed
Whether it already exists in the garden or purchased as a kit and installed by yourself, you can customize it to make it more pleasing to the eye.
In wood
Whatever its size, if you have to store tools in it: hedge trimmer, mower, pruner, garden hose… You can arrange the exterior to make the appearance more pleasant. Climbing ivy grows very quickly and covers the cabin with vegetation in no time. There are also some climbing vines giving good grapes, but they are slower to invest the place. The roses, the wisteria, are all natural decorations that have their effect.
If the hut is very small, you can pass it off as « the hut at the bottom of the garden » by cutting out a heart at breast height, the humorous touch will have its effect. If the garden shed is a little bigger, i.e. 4 to 5 m²it is possible to blend it in nature with a green or brown stain paint.
Galvanized
We cannot say that this material has charm, on the other hand, it is waterproof and cheap. This garden shed can be covered with wood, via pallets received free of charge or purchased at low cost. All you have to do is pull out the old nails, sand the boards, varnish them or paint them the color you want. By adding these new wooden slats, you can form a fake window, just enough to give the illusion that there is one, a trompe-l’oeil. We will install a small planter of flowers on the edge of the false window to give a little cachet to the structure.
A garden shed transformed into a playhouse for children
The dream of many children is the treehouse, but if you don’t have a tree, or it is too fragile, there is still the spirit of the treehouse.
Whether it’s an old cabin with worm-eaten boards or a garden tool shed, the frame can be used as the basis for creating the cabin of children’s dreams.
At first, you have to eliminate the old boards, check that the others are healthy as well as the frame.
Then, we must sand the boards to eliminate the gray color and nail some other wood lengthwise in order to add boards and enlarge the cabin, if it is really too small. The roof can be covered with tiles, corrugated sheets or wood. Treat the wood with an appropriate fungicide and insecticide, then varnish or paint the cabin. Hang curtains on the windows and a flower planter on its ledge.
Don’t forget the porch and its flowery railing, you can make it out of recovered pallets, it keeps the floor of the cabin clean. To access it, remember to install Japanese steps, it’s trendy and it avoids dirtying your shoes when passing through the wet grass. You can also connect a closed circuit fountain to attract birds.
An outhouse garden shed
Garden sheds can also be used as an office or as a barbecue and fondue chalet.
In an artist’s office or studio
It is enough that the chalet is large enough to put a desk and storage there, that the place is heated or ventilated and especially that the outside light enters the single room. With a sofa, the place can serve as an occasional bedroom. The exterior can be customized to indicate its intended purpose: paintings hung outside or a book shape carved out of wood and hung on the door for an author.
Kota in Finnish grill
This fashion is beginning to invade France, it has several advantages : a place always ready to receive guests for a barbecue, a friendly place in which you can also just have an aperitif and thus, you are protected from the weather, so the interior of the house does not smell of the barbecue .
The kota is a kind of small chalet with a fireplace and a few windows. Inside, a round or polygonal table is hollow in its center to place charcoal and grills. Each guest remains seated and just by stretching out his arm, he places his food to be cooked and takes care of it. An extractor hood above the grill draws the fumes outside. Of course, the kota already has a very marked design, but you can always customize the exterior.
Do not try to make a kota grill with pallets and a recovery hood, you risk suffocation. In a small chalet with a table and chairs, only fondues, aperitifs and traditional meals are safe.
Read also: When and how to replace an existing skylight?
