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About This Project
Anyone with a green thumb, energetic kids or a big yard needs more storage space. Kit sheds are one solution-they're cheap and functional. But you can do a lot better.
We designed this attached 7-1/2 x 13-ft. cedar shed to meet all your storage needs. It has a wide, no-sag sliding door on one end for big stuff like the lawn mower, and a separate section on the opposite end with lots of shelves for the small stuff, like pots and gardening supplies. The inexpensive barn sash windows allow plenty of light and ventilation. A lattice-walled overhang makes a nice outdoor potting area or a place to store your barbecue grill, and the rustic cedar exterior blends in with just about any house style. At $2,600 for materials, this garden shed costs more than the typical kit version, but it's well worth the extra money.
Even though we’ve engineered this shed to keep complicated figuring and cutting to a minimum, still a big construction project that will take you at least five or six weekends to complete. If you've built a deck or similar structure, you'll have no trouble putting in the foundation and building the walls. To help you through the trickier roof-framing stage, we'll show you how to make a rafter pattern without using any complex math. You may have to modify our plans slightly to fit your house, but all the basic building techniques we show will be the same.
No Special Tools Needed
You probably already own most of the basic carpentry tools
you'llneed to build this shed. Besides hand tools like a hammer, tape
measure, square, utility knife, chalk line, sharp chisel, handsaw and a few
screwdrivers, you'llneed a 4-ft. level, a line level and a power drill, plus the bits
listed in the story.
A circular saw will work for most of the cutting, but the windowsill and drip cap require bevel cuts that would be easier to make with a table saw. If you don’t own a table saw, ask a woodworker or a full-service lumberyard to cut these pieces for you. A power miter box is another optional tool that would add speed and accuracy to your cutting, especially for finish work. You can rent a power miter box for about $40 a day, but for a project this big, I'd recommend buying one (about $150).
Scope Out the Perfect Location
With its simple roof style, this shed can go just about
anywhere. Look for a spot on the back of your house where windows and doors
aren’t in the way. Behind or to the side of the garage is a good
location. We tied our shed roof into the garage roof, but you can also butt the
shed roof against a wall, as long as you install metal flashing under the
siding and over the shingles where the roof and wall
intersect.
In addition, consider:
Ground level. The ideal site is flat and sloping slightly away from the house. If the ground slopes steeply, either toward or away from the house, your job will be a lot harder. You'llhave to excavate and build retaining walls or bring in fill. In any case, regrade around the shed to ensure good drainage and provide a ramp for your lawn mower and wheelbarrow.
Roof pitch and headroom. This is the trickiest stage of planning. Our garage has 9-ft. tall walls and a shallow pitched roof. This combination allowed us to continue the roof in a straight line and still have enough headroom at the outside shed wall for standard-height windows and doors. But your house/garage might be different. To ensure adequate outer wall height, stretch a string along the roof and brace a 2x4 temporarily at the location of the outside wall to figure out how much headroom you'll have. Measure from the string representing the roof down to what will be the top of the 6x6 foundation beam. If this distance isn’t 90-3/4 in., you'll have to modify the wall height or change the roof slope of our shed plan.
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