So we’re looking at a house which has a rather shabby but giant garage that we’ll never need and a bit small garden. One obvious answer to this is to knock the garage down and replace it with a good sized shed, big enough to store the bikes (three adult and two kids) and lawnmower and small workbench – a bit smaller than a standard single garage seems ideal. Does anyone have any useful suggestions or advice?

Leave the garage and build the shed as well? You can never have too many sheds.

“…a bit smaller than a standard single garage seems ideal“

You’ll regret it and wish you’d built something bigger. At the very least design it so you can extend it if/when necessary.

I have a single garage and 7’x5′ shed and have just ordered a 8’x6′ shed. Couple bikes, workbench, mower etc fairly takes up the spaces…

I built an 8m x 4m workshop a few years back. Still too small!

A previous house of ours had a single garage and it was fine for a work bench, shelves, and five bikes hanging from the walls. As much as a double garage as a workshop is awesome, having a bit more garden is more important!

As much as a double garage as a workshop is awesome, having a bit more garden is more important!

Are you sure you’re on the right forum?

Put a climbing wall in the garage along with the workshop.
Its what I did and its great

I will admit to wondering if the hive mind of STW would be useful (“here’s a great shed I got last year”) or useless (“MORE SHEDS”). Clearly this is trending towards the latter.

I’ll rephrase my question: does anyone have any advice on what shed to buy that is solid and spacious enough to be used as a store and occasional workshop?

A climbing wall is an amazing idea!

I replaced a falling down shed with a 20′ x 12′ garage/workshop/dadcave. Got a bit of a row for how big it was but we’ll worth it. Go big or go home.

My advice would be to find a house with a rather shabby but giant garage and use that as a store and occasional workshop.

And then turf the flat roof ala Grand Designs for the kids to play on.

My last garage was just a single, but double height – walk-in loft.

My current workshop is 12m x 4.5m, and the garage (never put the cars in though) is the same size. Both are also tall enough that I need a proper ladder to get to the rafters 🙂

You can NEVER have too big workshop/garage.

Making it smaller likely means removing concrete flooring and foundations. This is a major pain in the ass. Hard to do unless you hire the right tools and loads of rubble to get rid off.

I have a single garage with about the same amount of stuff in. I wish it was bigger. It’s OK when it’s super tidy, but as soon as I need to do anything like service a bike or chop a sheet of ply it feels cramped.

I think you would be mad to knock down a big garage and build a shed. Not least because it’ll cost a bomb to get rid of the existing garage. If the garage is unsightly grow a few climbing roses/clematis/climbers over it.

I moved house specifically to get a big shed, so can be of no use here. Shed>garden, don’t do it!

That’s not a workshop, THIS is a workshop! WORKSHOP!!!!!

As to cost, part of the works will involve building a new drive way and putting a patio and the new shed on the land where the garage is currently, so this isn’t just a matter of swapping garage for shed.

Never have enough ‘mech’ storage space, two garages, three bays in a barn and two normal sheds and one decent one – still short!! Moral, build bigger than you think need.