Sheds are a useful but very personal addition to your garden. They vary from the practical (full of gardening tools, a home to many spiders and slightly too full of deckchairs) to the beautiful (mini garden rooms, complete with tea-making stations and chaise longues). We’re not promising you can transform your shed from one to the other, but we can promise that a neat and tidy shed makes it much easier to find things! Here are our top tips…
Add shelves
You can never have too many! Many sheds are narrow structures, so it might only be practical to fit shelves across the rear wall, but it’s definitely worth doing. Depending on your DIY ability and the strength of the shed walls, you can build your own shelves or use a shelving unit. Either way, try to get the shelving as high up the wall as possible to give you maximum storage space.
Put up hooks
Almost as necessary as shelving are hooks – as many as you have room for. Items left on the floor get trodden on, knocked over and damaged so if it’s small and light enough to go on the walls, that’s where it should be. In some sheds, the walls themselves are too flimsy to take hooks. In that case, make rails by screwing a piece of wood to two supports, and then put the hooks into the rail. This is ideal for smaller items such as hand forks and trowels.
Keep gardening gloves from wandering off by attaching clothes pegs to the hooks and pegging each pair together- this also works well to dry the gloves when they’re wet. Large garden tools such as spades and hoes take up a lot of room if you leave them standing on the floor – if you have a lot of tools, it also becomes impossible to get at the one you want! If you have sufficient wall space, they’re much better off hanging on hooks. For smaller items, you can generally find space on the back of the shed door for an extra hook or two, as well. Avoid hanging anything too heavy on here, though, as it will knock when you open the door.
Stack!
Plant pots are notorious for rolling off into corners, traps for the unwary ankle. Keep them in their place by stacking them in varying sizes – you can also use them as storage for smaller items. Plastic or terracotta pots don’t really need to be inside the shed at all, but will prefer to be kept off the ground. Put some outdoor shelving up against the shed wall, or just stand the pots on paving stones.
Keep organised
Take a tip from the kitchen and save large jam jars for use in the shed. They’re see through and rodent-proof, so ideal for storing seeds, left-over slug pellets and other small items. Probably a good idea to label them, though!
If you’re really tight for space, use the roof as well. Large, bulky but light items such as garden furniture cushions can be put into nets (it’s best not seal them in plastic bags as the damp may get in) and hung on a hook from the ceiling.
All images (c) Pixabay 2021 except where otherwise marked
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