In 2010 I was invited by Sarah James, the director of the Contemporary Craft Festival, to design a central garden feature for the festival show ground. This was an opportunity of realising an idea I'd had many years previously which was to make a garden pavilion using timber 'A'-frames. I made a scale model (photo below, far left), showed it to Dave Green at Sitting Firm; he loved the idea and agreed to make it, and this became the centrepiece of our 'craft garden'. Everything was pre-fabricated in the workshop in Western Red Cedar, with the frame components joined by specially made steel brackets. I wanted to introduce an element of colour and so had the brackets, fixings, and ridge powder-coated in a pale blue-green to fit in with my French Bench and Byrd-houses. The roof was hand-split Cedar shingle.













The idea was that this would be a small garden building that could be fitted out for various different uses : summer house, sun room, writer's retreat, artist's studio, children's playhouse, etc., etc. For the show I designed a range of fitted cabinets and shelves, and also a desk making it into a useful home office. The height to the ridge is 3.9m - just under the height limit required for planning permission. The design was well-received; almost everyone who went inside said : oh it's like the Tardis - there's so much space in here!













This was a one-off for Sitting Firm (who are now too busy with their main business of chair-making) but I am now working on designs with Hill-Top Joinery of Stow on the Wold, and so bespoke pavilions are again available to order.