8 hot tips to pimp a garden shed

It’s pretty grotty. But it’s so useful. What do you do when you shed looks like a dog’s dinner but is still standing strong? You’d rather not go the whole hog and replace it. There’s no need for that. But something has to be done before the spring alfresco entertainment kicks off in earnest.

Here’s how to pimp a sad-looking shed to bring it back to life. Maybe you want to give it a fresh new face and create something you can be proud of. Our 8 tips to pimp a garden shed will get you going.

How to transform a tatty garden shed

1. Paint your garden shed – Paint is cheap and anyone can paint a shed. It doesn’t require skill, just the right materials and a few hours of easy work. Buy proper exterior wood paint. Choose one shade or a small selection of three cool heritage colours. Paint it a dark colour to make it disappear into the background, a pale colour to make it stand out. Add patterns if you like, either hand-done, using home made stencils, or with ready-made stencils. Because it’s a shed, an informal finish looks good. Think shabby chic.
2. Stain your garden shed – Wood stains are brilliant and come in a wealth of colours. You can buy them in lovely blues, greens, reds and pinks as well as traditional wood-like colours, everything from dark to pale. They also work hard to protect the wood against the elements and are generally easy to use. A simple colour change makes such a difference to a garden shed.
3. Add curtains – If your shed looks far too sheddy and practical, and you’d rather it looked like a pretty garden building instead, give the outside a good clean and add colourful curtains to the windows.
4. Decorate it – There are no rules. You can decorate your garden shed in any way you like to add interest to a dull, practical structure. Paint enormous daisies all over it. Cover it in red and pink painted hearts. Give it a colourful border using a stencil or print patterns around the middle in a band using a stamp made from a potato. Let the kids go mad, decorating it in their own vivid style. You can use exterior varnish over the top when it’s finished to give the decor a long life.
5. Stick stuff on it. Stickers, for a start! Or dangle things from it. Imagine a row of flint pebbles with holes in the middle, found on a beach in England’s south east, hung on different types of string from the eaves. Picture an old fishing net thrown over the roof with plastic sea creatures and old glass fishing floats attached. Think crazy, do unusual, be unique.
6. Plant lovely things around it, and even all over it so you can’t actually see your shed any more. Job done! Choose evergreen for year-round fun, use fast-growing climbers for an instant effect.
7. Hide it. If your shed is too horrid for words, hide it completely behind woven willow or hazel fence panels, also called hurdles. Use pretty bamboo screening if you like, or ordinary fence panels painted or decorated to look smart.
8. Maintain it the normal way – clean the shed outdoors and in. Seal the roof with special paint for polycarbonate or bitumen shed rooves. Sand and varnish the outside. Add extra lengths wood inside to make the structure stronger. All this will go a long way towards making it look good for longer.

If all that makes you feel tired, bored and tearful, there’s a simple alternative. Dismantle your shed, give it to someone else, recycle or re-use the wood, or throw the dratted thing away. Then replace it with a stunning, practical item or two of smart garden storage from our friends at Keter.