I built the base for this greenhouse a few weeks ago (please click here to read the earlier base-building entry) and returned this week with the timber, glass and shelving to complete the job.
I had such a great time building Bob and Pam's greenhouse this week. They were so welcoming and excited about their greenhouse and absolutely thrilled with the finish. Bob has offered to show off this building to prospective customers. I'm delighted to say this is a common offer by my customers and we can usually find someone near(ish) to you if you'd like to visit to see a Green Bug greenhouse up close.
Unfortunately it rained most of Wednesday but I managed to carry on with constructing the greenhouse without any problems and completed the building on Thursday afternoon.
This greenhouse has 4 auto-opening windows in the roof, two manual windows on the two sides and a cold frame either side of the porch - together with all the shelving, guttering, coat rack - everything I could think of so you can simply step into the greenhouse and start using it the moment I've finished.
I made a short video of building this greenhouse right from the foundations, building the walls and flooring right up to putting the finials on and shelving the inside.
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Here is the foundation trench excavated, and the foundations finished. I stepped the foundations to reach a level over the sloping ground. Here I'm laying the concrete flags over weedblock sheeting, laid over a sand base. I put gravel to the sides to create a useful run-off for water, or for standing pots in.
Time to replace this old aluminum greenhouse with something safer, more accessible, robust and spacious - one with cold frames, an internal raised bed, loads of headroom, a large opening door and even a coat rack. The base is completed after 3 days work and I will return in 3 weeks time with the completed greenhouse, glass and shelving to complete. I was asked to leave a small gap in the rear wall so that a vine can be grown through it. The idea is to keep the roots of the vine cool but get maximum heat and light to the rest of the plant.
It's a great garden but the owners find it a pain having nowhere to store all the gardening tools they use and don't want them in a greenhouse - so I'm building a small shed annex at the back of this greenhouse. It's going to be clad in wany edged cedar with a black epdm roof - which will also have an opening roof window in it. There are two opening side windows in the greenhouse and 4 auto-opening ones in the roof - this garden gets a lots of sun so ventilation is going to help cool the inside. I will insulate the walls of the shed to stop that becoming a hot box too. The old greenhouse has been removed in the picture below and I now need to excavate down to the foundations by removing the concrete blocks and soil. I added a new strip foundation to the left and leveled off the interior floor space. Here's the finished base with a long cold frame to the right side.
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