[Image Removed by User]I got the pallets and packing crates free. Some pallets have a deposit on them so you should always ask, but the electrical wholesaler next to my work unit was happy for me to take these away and my firm were good enough to lend me their trailer. The packing crate was great because it was over six feet long and made the floor and the corner posts. It was from the water board and they were just about to cut it up and put it in a skip - one had already gone in which was such a shame as it is excellent timber.

This is what it looked like some time around the 27 October 2007.

[Image Removed by User]Assembling the corner posts was fun without a spare pair of hands, but once the temporary bracing was in place they stayed where they were OK. The corners are just made from a couple of five-by-one planks butt nailed together.

[Image Removed by User]A simple pent roof was the obvious design but at four feet wide I just didn’t have any timber long enough to give any kind of overhang so I put an apex roof on. I’m pleased I did because I love how it looks. I thought I’d need some kind of tie beams on the rafters but actually the sarking dissipates all of the spreading forces so I can stand up in the shed with my hands above my head and not touch the roof!

I’d tried to design a pointy bit for the end of the ridge to keep the devil from sitting on the roof, but it looked silly so I later cut it off.

[Image Removed by User]The little porch roof is more for show but it does shelter the door a bit, especially at the top where the rain might drive in. The door took a bit of time to build. It’s a frame of four-by-one clad with butted planks. The fancy pattern braces the frame and lets the rain run out to the sides rather than drive through the door. It’s quite heavy so it’s held on with three hinges. There’s no bolt because i don’t plan on locking it - if someone’s going to nick my kettle they’re going to do it whether I lock the shed or not so I’d just as soon they didn’t damage my shed while they’re at it. And in any event, I’d be very unlucky to get broken into because Wash Common is a really safe area.

The roof is waterproofed with roofing underlay. It’s not the proper felt with the granite chips because I used what I had but I do have some felt adhesive so if I buy a bag of granite chippings I could actually stick them on. I think they help keep the UV from degrading the bitumen so it might be worth doing.

The shed has a coat of magnolia emulsion and I’ve picked out the door, fascia and soffits in poppy, but it needs another coat to look good and now Winter’s here I don’t know when I’ll be able to do that.

In all it’s taken me five weeks to build and has cost me £40. I love it. I wouldn’t have a bought shed if you paid me. It’s very environmentally-friendly because the pallets just go to land-fill and it’s a wonderful bit of self-expression, but not everyone can afford the 100+ hours it took to build so it’s probably not for everyone.

This is what it looked like 17 November 2007.

[Image Removed by User] With the shed complete the next essential was tea. This is the stove I bought off e-bay from The Daisy Patch for £65 delivered. The idea was that I’d be able to fire it with wood that I grew on my allotment coppice but it hasn’t actually worked out quite like that because the top of the stove doesn’t get quite hot enough on wood. Probably would on coal but I really wanted to be carbon-neutral. Anywho, it still makes a snug shed with the stove lit.

[Image Removed by User]And this is us the other week having a nice afternoon over the allotment. Plans for this year are to give it another coat of paint and I’m thinking seriously about installing solar electric to boil the kettle. It needs a window too, and I’d quite like to extend it so that I could get a sofa in there too.

Hi Uncle Wilco, fellow Sheddies

Glad the forum’s alive again. Count-down to Shed Week, wow, nervous times. I want to share the poem of dedication that I wrote for my shed.

On the topping-out of a pallet shed on the Wash Common allotment

Shed: May your hearth be ever stacked with sticks
for your pot bellied stove, with a hot kettle
for tea, and may the mice not find the PG Tips,
nor rats discover Hob Nobs in their metal
tin. Even when the sleet is beating hard
inside you’ll be bone dry, and though you’re built
from pallets that the wasteful just discard
your cladding will not split, nor will you tilt.
But what if I’d have gone to B&Q?
A golden pine pavilion would adorn
my plot. No hearth, no chimney pot, no flue,
no soul. You’re great, by oak, pine, thorn and yew:
this wood has found a home. So let’s adjourn
for cake, and toast this shed with a fresh brew.