mr_magicfingers
Well-known member
Hi all,
been a long time occasional lurker on her, usually when I'm on odd shifts and find myself at a loose end, I'll come on here and look at the amazing shops and garages everyone has. I've never had a shop of my own, though I did have a 2 car garage for 4 years which I used to do some carpentry and basic spannering. other than that I've been without a place to work for many years, usually service the bikes on the street or a driveway.
Well, last year, my girlfriend and I bought a little farm in Devon, England, with a plan to get out of our crazy jobs and find a quieter way of life. We have a plan to turn the farm into a small camp site and have our own little homestead.
One of the things I loved about the place was that it had a big old workshop, which had once been a cow shed. I looked at it and thought 'if I pour a concrete floor, throw some insulation on the walls and sheetrock it, I could be happy in here'. Of course, then my girlfriend said 'what about MY workshop' as her hobby is making hats and painting, so suddenly it needed to be bigger to become 2 workshops and had to be more comfortable for the colder months.
After a few weeks of thinking, planning and long conversations, we realised that trying to turn the old workshop into a new workshop was just going to be a kludge. What we should do is tear it down and start from scratch, building the workshops that would be our happy spaces for the next couple of decades that we plan to be here. We got together with an architect, looks at the rules for building something new, considered our plot and came up with something that would work for us both.
The walls will be blockwork with insulation between the two layers, insulated metal roof, and large aluminium windows. The garage door is sized to let me drive the tractor inside and close the door after it, so I can work inside on just about any piece of equipment we have.
There's two workshops, one for each of us, hers is for painting and millinery crafts, mine will be a general purpose woodshop/workshop. There's a garage/mechanic workshop for working on bikes, teaching myself to weld etc and a store room full of shelving for all the things there's no room for in the house but we want safely stored, like sports gear etc.
Things not on the plan:
In the garage, above the garage door height, between the two walls, there will be a steel I beam, rated for 2 tonnes, on which will be a roller and hoist.
The garage will have a reinforced concrete floor.
The two workshops and the store room will have concrete floors with insulated screed and underfloor heating. The workshops will be heated in the winter, the store will have a thermostat so that it's only heated enough for frost prevention. Decided not to put underfloor in the garage as screed isn't strong enough, but it will eventually have the big woodburner currently in the living room of the house when the house is renovated. Yes, we're building the workshops before we renovate the house
The electrical supply will come into the dry store when it's upgraded by the power company, there will also, eventually be solar pv on the roof of the workshop too.
We're part way through the build now, so I'll update this thread with pictures of progress shortly. Feel free to ask questions or comment on what/how we're doing this.
J.
been a long time occasional lurker on her, usually when I'm on odd shifts and find myself at a loose end, I'll come on here and look at the amazing shops and garages everyone has. I've never had a shop of my own, though I did have a 2 car garage for 4 years which I used to do some carpentry and basic spannering. other than that I've been without a place to work for many years, usually service the bikes on the street or a driveway.
Well, last year, my girlfriend and I bought a little farm in Devon, England, with a plan to get out of our crazy jobs and find a quieter way of life. We have a plan to turn the farm into a small camp site and have our own little homestead.
One of the things I loved about the place was that it had a big old workshop, which had once been a cow shed. I looked at it and thought 'if I pour a concrete floor, throw some insulation on the walls and sheetrock it, I could be happy in here'. Of course, then my girlfriend said 'what about MY workshop' as her hobby is making hats and painting, so suddenly it needed to be bigger to become 2 workshops and had to be more comfortable for the colder months.
After a few weeks of thinking, planning and long conversations, we realised that trying to turn the old workshop into a new workshop was just going to be a kludge. What we should do is tear it down and start from scratch, building the workshops that would be our happy spaces for the next couple of decades that we plan to be here. We got together with an architect, looks at the rules for building something new, considered our plot and came up with something that would work for us both.
The walls will be blockwork with insulation between the two layers, insulated metal roof, and large aluminium windows. The garage door is sized to let me drive the tractor inside and close the door after it, so I can work inside on just about any piece of equipment we have.
There's two workshops, one for each of us, hers is for painting and millinery crafts, mine will be a general purpose woodshop/workshop. There's a garage/mechanic workshop for working on bikes, teaching myself to weld etc and a store room full of shelving for all the things there's no room for in the house but we want safely stored, like sports gear etc.
Things not on the plan:
In the garage, above the garage door height, between the two walls, there will be a steel I beam, rated for 2 tonnes, on which will be a roller and hoist.
The garage will have a reinforced concrete floor.
The two workshops and the store room will have concrete floors with insulated screed and underfloor heating. The workshops will be heated in the winter, the store will have a thermostat so that it's only heated enough for frost prevention. Decided not to put underfloor in the garage as screed isn't strong enough, but it will eventually have the big woodburner currently in the living room of the house when the house is renovated. Yes, we're building the workshops before we renovate the house
The electrical supply will come into the dry store when it's upgraded by the power company, there will also, eventually be solar pv on the roof of the workshop too.
We're part way through the build now, so I'll update this thread with pictures of progress shortly. Feel free to ask questions or comment on what/how we're doing this.
J.
) and built a workshop space in the back of a tin barn we have. We studded the space with 2x4, insulated with 4" of celotex insulation, boarded with 3/8 plywood, had it wired for power and lights and I installed an old woodburner that we found in the back of the barn and which I stripped and repainted. 
