I can’t stand most of spring. I much prefer the bitterness of January or blistering heat of July, where at least you know what you’re getting, rather than the hot and cold of March in New England. But I might change my mind if I had an inviting indoor-outdoor garden shed in the English countryside like UK blogger Jeska Hearne and her husband Dean. In it, I would wait out the month with a cup of tea and the floor-to-ceiling doors open or closed, depending.
The Hearnes, who also run online housewares shop The Future Kept, call it their tea (or “G&T”) shed at the bottom of their countryside garden: “In the day I love to brew up a cup (or pot if I have visitors) on the old stove and read my current book, or snooze with the sounds of the neighborhood in summer as a lullaby. In the evenings we love to wander down again and have a gin and tonic while all the insects buzz about at sunset,” Jeska says. Here’s a look inside this very English garden escape.
Photography courtesy of Jeska Hearne.
Though it looks well-lived-in, the structure is only a year old: Jeska used a pre-built shed with accordion glass doors (for more information, see Walton’s) and painted it in Bedec Eco Barn Paint in black, “a nod to the famous fishing huts of Hastings.” She plans on adding a window to the cupboard (at left) to transform it into an easy-access potting shed; for now, it hides the lawnmower.
“We wanted the feel of an old, rustic, pulled-together shanty, using handmade decoration throughout,” Jeska says. Case in point: the low daybed, which she built from five recycled apple crates topped with a memory foam mattress. The couple pulls it inside during the winter to protect it from dampness.
To water the houseplants, Jeska “dips into that with a hand-held watering can once a week;” she uses the UK-made Copper Watering Can from The Future Kept (€49, or $51.69 USD).
“We collected the wood from all over the place. It’s mostly pallets that we ripped apart, then painted to age them, mixed with old floorboards from a skip we happened to pass on a trip to London and a few slices of antique parquet flooring a friend gave us,” Jeska says. She uses the paraffin stove to heat water in the kettle for tea. (“It looks great but I’m looking for something safer,” she admits.)
On the couple’s list of weekend projects for spring and summer? Expanding the deck and adding a small wood stove, for winter.
“I am always hungry for nostalgia so I hope we did a good job of making it look old,” Jeska says. “The patina of time can only be a bonus.”
For more of our favorite outbuildings, check out our posts:
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