This lovely 10'x10' shed was delivered to Fruitland Park, Florida, a beautiful area with many lakes. The owner had a newer stucco over block home, but wanted a shed with a little traditional Craftsman flair for the yard.
The shed is set on a wood deck, strapped down into concrete, cypress siding, and a 5-V crimp metal galvanized roof. The shed has Craftsman style eave brackets, a 3/1 double hung window, and Craftsman styling on the 4' wide beadboard shed door. It is accented nicely by the owner's classic color choices. After it was installed, we received this lovely email from the owner:
"Glenn and I couldn't be more pleased with our new garden shed. Craig spent a lot of time 'tweaking' and the pride he takes in his product is now obvious. Again, we are very pleased and have started to 'move in' today. Thank you for being so attentive to the finishing. Will send pictures when we're done installing walkway, plants, etc. Your sheds need to be featured in home and garden magazines....they are unique!"
Historic Shed is an offshoot of Preservation Resource, Inc., a historic preservation consulting company. Under the PRI umbrella, we have worked on a variety of historic building projects, including the Tampa Interstate Study project in Ybor City. More recently, we began a project near our Historic Shed shop in Brooksville at the Chinsegut Hill Manor House.
Settled in the 1840s, the Chinsegut Hill Manor House property has links to many important eras in history including: the initial development of Florida during the pioneer years; the development of a Florida slave plantation and its transformation after the Civil War; the US labor movement including women’s and children’s labor regulations; women’s suffrage; early 1900 literature; the Russian Revolution; the Great Depression and the Civilian Conservation Corp; and the early years of University of South Florida development. Details on its development and history can be found at the Friends of Chinsegut Hill website.
We began our involvement in the Manor House renovation when a locally formed non-profit, Friends of Chinsegut Hill, managed to convince the Hernando County Board of County Commissioners that the building could and should be saved for public use, and secured grants through the Florida Division of Historical Resources for the planning and stabilization of the building. Through the first grant, PRI was hired to prepare a Historic Structures Report, documenting the building's past development, current condition, and planning for its future.
Investigations of the house revealed some serious foundation issues. PRI, along with a local house moving company, Atlas, LLC, made the necessary foundation repairs. Then the Florida legislature secured $1.5 million in funding for the full rehabilitation of the house. PRI was brought on board as the building contractor.
To kick off the project, we constructed a small shed to hold the project permits and store small tools. The 3'x3' shed was placed near a family cemetery on the property and has architectural elements that complement the main house.
The renovation work at the house will take many months. Current work is focusing on the building exterior, repairing siding and windows, replacing columns and rebuilding the two story porch where needed. Interior repairs will include lots of plaster work and bringing the existing interior trim back to life.
Two small historic cabins are located near the manor house. Both date from the 1930s when a CCC camp was established on the extensive property. The cabins will hopefully be brought back to life once the main house renovation is complete.
Tampa Bay Times writer Logan Neill wrote a lovely feature article on Historic Shed that ran in Sunday's paper. We'd spoken to Mr. Neill several times over the past year as a local non-profit struggled to save the historic Chinsegut Hill Manor House. Mr. Neill, a Brooksville resident, has been one of the biggest advocates of saving the antebellum house and our paths crossed as we became involved in the project.
Here's the article he wrote about Historic Shed:
Brooksville business matches new outbuildings with historic structures
When a local artist called Historic Shed for her new art studio, she knew exactly what she wanted. She'd been saving our ad from a magazine for several years and had sketched up all her ideas in her notebook. We built her a 12' x 12' shed with paired French doors on three sides. A 4' roof extension on the front is supported by large brackets, providing shelter for her doors and a seating area. The shed has a metal roof and cypress siding.
A flash back to construction below: the exterior shell took 3 days to put up. After the electrical and AC unit was installed, Historic Shed finished out the shed interior with drywall and cypress trim. The roof framing and sheathing was left exposed for and open look.
The side yard is often where AC units, electrical meters, and garbage cans find refuge, but you can also use the side yard for covered storage, making it useful and attractive. For people with a wide side yard, you can put in a large storage unit like this 6'x12' shed, but even those with a narrow side yard can get a nice bit of storage that looks good.
The City of Ormond Beach, Florida proudly titles itself the "Birthplace of Speed" with a long history of auto racing that started in 1902 on the hard packed beach sand when automobiles were new and existing roads were poor.
After the Winton Bullet won a Challenge Cup against the Olds Pirate by a breathtaking two-tenths of a second in 1903, Ormond Beach established itself as the ideal proving ground for automobile designers and racing aficionados from around the world. Motorcycle and automobile owners and drivers brought vehicles powered by gasoline, steam and electric engines, sometimes cruising at over 100 miles per hour along the ocean side. You can see actual race footage on the beach from 1905 on YouTube at Ormond Beach Florida Auto Races.
While autos may still drive along the beach, beach racing is now only commemorated at Birthplace of Speed Park, located on A1A at the intersection of SR40. The park has a series of markers telling the story of racing and provide wonderful views of the ocean.
The park used to showcase two replicas of the two history-changing racers, the Winton Bullet and the Olds Pirate, but the ocean climate made maintaining the cars difficult and they were removed for repairs. Members of the Motor Racing Heritage Association decided that it would be ideal to bring back another piece of Ormond Beach racing history and place it in the park to protect the replica cars.
The Ormond Garage was built in 1904 by Henry Flagler, railroad magnate and owner of the Ormond Hotel, to accommodate participating race cars during the beach races (and to keep them away from the front of his hotel). The large garage housed the drivers and mechanics during the speed time trials, while the owners and manufacturers stayed at the hotel.
While much larger than could be accommodated within the park, the old garage was to serve as design inspiration for a new structure to house and protect the replica race cars in Birthplace of Speed Park. The Motor Racing Heritage Association began fund raising in order to build the garage, and came to Historic Shed to discuss the project. After a few design iterations to make the project more affordable, and a couple of years of fund raising, the project was officially launched at the end of 2012. Last week, the interior was completed and the first of the replica cars will move in shortly.
This very fun project would not have been the same without Suzanne Heddy, Director of the Ormond Beach Historical Society and Motor Racing Heritage Association Treasurer; Ron Piasecki, President of the Motor Racing Heritage Association, Inc.; and Dan Smith, Hometown News writer and Motor Racing Heritage Association's "Go To Guy" and the numerous other racing history fans in the area. We offer so many thanks for their direction, entertainment and support!
Some more info on the garage project and racing history can be found at these links:
A tribute to the famous Ormond Garage 1904-1976
Ormond Garage replica going up in Speed Park
City’s heritage on display with new replica garage
Green shed marks auto racing's starting line
The History of Speed in Ormond Beach
Motor Racing Heritage Association
Ormond Beach Historical Society
Historic Shed's most recent project was constructed in Tampa's historic Seminole Heights neighborhood to complement an interesting, and virtually unchanged Craftsman bungalow. The owners needed to replace a metal shed that had reached a state of extreme disrepair and wanted the new building to reflect the design of their home.
Click the images below to see a slideshow of the entire shed construction process.
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Historic Shed was contacted by an artist in Ormond Beach, Florida to design and build a unique shed to be used as an art studio. The studio shed incorporates a salvaged wood door with sidelights, a dutch door and lots of windows. To top it off, it has a fun color scheme, perfect for the beach location.
Historic Shed recently built a 12'x16' board and batten shed along the shore of lovely Lake Griffin in Fruitland Park, FL. The shed will serve as a bunkhouse for guests.
Plans for this shed are now available for sale at: https://historicshed.com/store-4/?model_number=HS001
Historic Shed was approached by a homeowner in Palm Harbor to design and build a custom shed to serve as both storage and a covered family bar seating area. The shed we designed and built is 12'x18' with a 4' covered porch area. The shed was divided by an interior wall into a 13' storage area and a 4' bar area to house snack and drink storage and a television. The storage area is accessed by a double set of carriage house style doors on the side. The bar area has a single door access on the side and two awning covered opening with a wide cypress counter-top. The awnings are opened using a pulley system. The project is delightfully accented by a tropical color scheme.
See another version of the Snack Shack here: https://historicshed.com/craftsman-snack-shack/
Historic Shed recently completed the construction of this custom designed gable roof storage shed to complement a historic home in the Old Seminole Heights Neighborhood in Tampa, FL. The shed uses design elements from the main house such as roof slope, exposed rafter tails, eave brackets, metal 5-V crimp roof, and gable end vent to create a shed that blends seamlessly in the bungalow neighborhood. The new shed replaced a historic garage that had extensive termite damage. Since the new shed was under 150 sf, the project did not require a permit under Tampa's regulations, but did get approved by the local historic preservation office.
A recent Historic Shed project was designed for the owner to use as a watercolor painting studio. At 10'x10', the shed did not require a building permit in the City of St. Petersburg.
The studio shed incorporates a door that the owner had saved from the main house many years before. Termites has done extensive damage to the bottom of the door, which we trimmed down and patched.
The interior was finished out with drywall and a tiny wall AC unit will keep the studio comfortable in summer months.
The shed complements a 1920s bungalow that the owners have lived in for over 30 years.
Most of the people who contact Historic Shed about building an outbuilding have a historic home that they want to complement. A few have more modern style homes but want something traditional in their backyard. Our most recent project was a cross between the two. The house at the site is new but has Craftsman influences in the design, so we designed the new one-car garage with details that reflect the newly built home.
Not all sheds have to be freestanding in the backyard. Side yards can provide much needed storage areas and go from barely used to extremely useful with the proper shed set next to the side of a house. Sheds can range in size from large to small, depending on your storage needs and allowable space.
Narrower yards may not be able to accommodate a shed quite this large, but you still can usually add some significant storage space. The Historic Shed Thin Storage Shed and Thin Gable Shed fit nicely in tight side yards while still allowing a walkable path. Historic Shed outbuildings and storage units can be customized for nearly any size space.
For more tight space storage ideas, see the small storage page on our website.
Historic Shed recently completed this 10'x14' custom garden shed to complement a 1920s residence in the Hyde Park historic neighborhood in Tampa. The storage shed features a gable roof with exposed rafter tails and eave brackets similar to the main house.