Celebrities and politicians are selling their Lego creations on eBay to mark the toy’s 50th anniversary.

Trevor Baylis is an inventor whose most famous invention is a wind-up radio. Aged 70, he runs Trevor Baylis Brands, a company dedicated to aiding inventors.

“When I picked up the box of Lego I did wonder what I was going to do with it. I thought that the obvious thing would be to make a building but that’s a bit boring. Then I looked around my workshop – the graveyard of a thousand domestic appliances – and I said, ‘Blimey, this is perfect’, so I’ve made a reproduction of my workshop.

“There’s my workbench with my lathe on it, my pillar drill, my grinding wheel, my grindstone, a computer and a first-aid box. It was a bit of fun, and you know what, I can understand why kids play with it: it’s good stuff.

“I’m a Meccano man, simply because Lego wasn’t around when I was born. I couldn’t write my name but I could do the most amazing things with Meccano and I could tell you what bolt, what washer, gear and goodness knows what by the time I was five. There’s an expression I like, ‘chance favours the prepared mind’. It means that there are certain skills in your life you’ll never forget, and they are the sort of skills that Lego and Meccano give you.”

you can bid on to win the Lego workshop here.

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A great tutorial My DIY Shed by Dan McGrath - who’s shed is shared here, I must have seen this build tutorial before but can’t remember.

I wanted a shed for my garden, I also wanted a hot-tub and/or a ride on lawnmower.
Both of these are big, so I’ll be needing a shed with wide doors. I also wanted a square shed, most sheds in the DIY shops are rectangular.

I also wanted a shed with a reasonably high door, so I don’t have to duck to get in - a reasonably high door also means a reasonably high ceiling. I wanted a pavillion type roof because they look cool, and because flat roofs are generally boring and are a leak just waiting to happen.

Read more and see step by step guide at his website.

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Radio 4’s afternoon reading has Jennings’ Little Hut By Anthony Buckeridge

Mark Willams reads a five-part serialisation of one of Anthony Buckeridge’s classic school stories, in which Jennings and his loyal friend Darbishire build a hut, lose a goldfish, smash a cucumber frame, and embarrass the Headmaster in front of the school’s most distinguished Old Boy.

Info here Thanks to Simon for the shedsup.

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Share your shed for “Shed of the Year 2008″ and win £500 worth of prizes.

The race is on to win the coveted Shed of the Year title which will be held this summer as part of the second National Shed Week.

We are very pleased to announce that one of the UK’s leading online garden building companies, Garden Buildings Directwill be the official sponsor and shed partner for this year’s Shed Week and will be providing the grand prize for the Shed of the Year Competition.

The grand prize will total £500 and the winner will be able to choose products from Garden Buildings Direct or products from one of their sister websites selling extensive ranges of garden furniture, outdoor toys, fitness equipment and BBQ’s.

Organised by the internationally famous readersheds.co.uk, National Shed Week (which runs from July 7 until July 13 2008) will celebrate one of the cornerstones of British culture, the not so humble Garden Shed.

Can this year’s sheddies beat the wonderful and unique sheds that we showcased in the inaugural Shed Week last year, including the amazing Shed of the Year 2007 which was a Roman Temple built by Tony Rogers?

This year’s judges are property guru Sarah Beeny, wind-up radio inventor Trevor Baylis, Professor of beach huts Kathryn Ferry and Shedworking expert Alex Johnson, Eco-architect Lloyd Alter and to give his sheddies eye view last years winner Tony Rogers.

Sheddies are still welcome to “Share their Sheds” and can enter their buildings on the website ready for the judging in Late June.

About the sponsor
Garden Buildings Direct is part of a number of websites owned by Kybotech Ltd started in 2000, however the business family tree goes back to 1878. Charles & William Walton are the 5th generation of the Walton family connected with the manufacturing of garden buildings and garden related products, based in Sutton-on-Trent the centre for garden buildings since 1927.

They are an online retailer who successfully operate a family of home, garden and leisure retail brands:

Simply Garden Furniture

Outdoor Toys Direct

Flaming Barbecues

Garden Centre Direct

Simply Fitness Equipment

Their main product lines go under the brand name of BillyOh.com with ranges of Wooden Sheds, Plastic Garden Sheds, Metal Garden Sheds, Summerhouses, Metal Greenhouses, Wooden Garden Storage, Plastic Garden Storage, Gazebos, Home Offices, Shed Security, Shed Electrics and Arbours as well as garden furniture and BBQ’s.

About National Shed Week

This is the second year we have run the competition which pits wooden sheds against TARDIS, garden offices against beach huts in a battle royal to win the title of Shed of the Year 2008.

After the success of last year’s Shed Week and the great reaction we got from press and the public, Sarah Beeny has agreed to become a judge again, along with inventor and entrepreneur Trevor Baylis.

They are joined by Shedworking expert Alex Johnson, Kathryn Ferry who is a beach hut expert and Treehugger and Eco-housing guru Lloyd Alter.

Contact us

To get access to hires images and more information on Shed week go to our press section

Competition Terms and Conditions.

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Belated happy wossname to Shed of the year judge Trevor Bayliss for the 13th May he is now 71!

A grand age for a sheddie, just getting to his prime!

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It’s Be Nice to Nettles Week - 14 - 25 May 2008

Highlighting that the stinging nettle plays a very important role for both rural and urban wildlife supporting over 40 species of insect including some of our most colourful butterflies.

The stinging nettle is one of the most important native plants for wildlife in the UK. An ideal home for insects.

More info here, maybe you could create your own nettle patch, but I know some allotment sheddies are well ahead of the game.

I have done my part already with a few bottle of Hugh Fernley Whittingstall wossname River Cottage stinger Ale made from organic nettles, a nice rounded beer I found…

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Well here on shedblog and readersheds have always know that sheds are special and the general media has started to pick it up again, which is good, The indypendant has a great article on how sheds are helping the current UK credit crunch.

Ten years ago, it went upmarket and became an outsourced office or library for groovy rus in urbe metropolitans; powered by subterranean cables, it featured electric lights, wall heaters, a telephone and sockets for computer, printer and hi-fi – a warm, humming, creative environment, where you could spend hours in contentedly self-delighted browsing, musing and occasional guilty bursts of playing air guitar along with Slash or Mark Knopfler.

Today, it’s become a display cabinet of technological sophistication: a home cinema, a cocktail bar, a personalised, chill-out, son-et-lumière zone of wistful shadows and ambient mood music. Some owners have gone so far as to install a chaise longue, a bed, a fridge and Gaggia espresso machine to replicate, only a few feet from their home, the feel of a very upmarket hotel room.

of course some sheds are like this, but we know a shed can be anything, as long as it’s the retreat that we all want.

read more here.

now all we need to do is get some of those posh sheddies to share their sheds for Shed of the year.

via shedworking.

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As Alex pointed out in his shed preview of the Chelsea Flower show, It’s a same that it’s not a a good year for outbuildings.

But these ones looks interesting.

From Writtle College

But Marshalls have a “timber orb den” in there The Marshalls Garden That Kids Really Want!

Which has a lot of potential.

You can see live coverage on the RHS website now

in fact the last time I looked, I am sure they were building a shed.

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I am very pleased to announce that we have another judge for Shed of the Year 2008 to add to our expert line-up, Lloyd Alter - who I read most days on the excellent www.treehugger.com.

image from treehugger

Lloyd Alter has been an architect, developer, inventor and prefab promoter. He now writes for green websites TreeHugger and Planet Green, and teaches sustainable design at Ryerson University School of Interior Design.

In the course of his work developing small residential units and prefabs, Lloyd became convinced that we just use too much of everything- too much space, too much land, too much food, too much fuel, too much money, and that the key to sustainability is to simply use less. And, the key to happily using less is to design things better.

So sheddies welcome Lloyd to the judging panel and I am sure his expertise in all things eco sheddie will serve Shed Week well, he joins property guru Sarah Beeny, wind-up radio inventor Trevor Baylis, Professor of beach huts Kathryn Ferry and Shedworking expert Alex Johnson.

We seem to be getting more and more international sheds this year, of course they can’t win the coveted title of Shed of the year, but we will be having a special prize for our non UK sheddies, and maybe next year international sheddies will have a competition of their own.

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Sorry for the delay on announcing who has won the £30 amazon voucher for signing up to get the latest sheds in your inbox.

We had over 200 subscribers but there was 20 odd that have not Verified their email, so are not included

The winner is Laura Cameron and I will be getting your amazon.co.uk voucher to you next week but remember you can still get the shed via RSS or in your inbox below.

It will give you can insight of what to vote for in Shed of the Year 2008.

thanks

wilco

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