Every woman needs a safe place to escape from the daily pressures and recharge. This escape is often called a she shed. Having a busy schedule demands today’s modern woman to be a multi-tasker. This leaves less time for her to do things just for her. Let’s first look at what a she shed is.
A she shed is a safe and private get-away space that can be in a room of the house or detached from the house. It is where a woman can focus on their own interests and activities without interruptions from her daily obligations.
A she shed can be designed to reflect your own personal tastes. Do whatever makes you feel better in this private hide-away.
First step is to reflect upon what you would like to do when but don’t have the place to do them.
Prepare Your Wish List of What You Want To Do in Your She Shed
Write out a list of things you have not been able to do because you haven’t had the time or place to do them.
These activities could be reading, writing a novel, watching TV, exercise, yoga, texting your friends, surfing the net, sun bathing, … Just start jotting them down.
Once you have this list, you will have a better idea of how much space you will need to accomplish these tasks, hobbies, activities.
A 20 foot long shipping container will provide the instant walls, floor, and ceiling to house your new she shed. It is a great way to start making your she shed dream come true really quick and easily.
You would be surprised to find how much space a 20 foot shipping container can offer.
Look how someone listed their needs and how the shipping container was transformed to become her special hide-away.
A She Shed for a Lady Who Loves to Read, Watch Movies, Sun Bath, and Enjoy Outdoors
I designed a she shed for a woman named Joslyn.
Joslyn is a married mother of two teenage kids. A boy and a girl.
She is also a nurse.
As you can imagine, during this pandemic and between being a full time nurse and mother, she has had very little, and much needed, personal time to unwind and do things that will bring her spirits up.
A private retreat that is not far from the house and is as detached from the house and her work as she would also like to be is her ideal place to just be herself.
Joslyn loves movies and trashy romantic novels. She has dreamed for year to write screen play or novel but hasn’t had the place spread out her papers and to just allow her to creative mind to flow with great stories to write about.
A little glass of Italian Pinot Grigio is one of her winding down delights. It reminds her of a romantic get-away before the kids were born in the vineyards of Tuscany. An outdoor siting area would be a great place to relax. There, she can hear the birds singing and enjoy the gentle breezes during sunsets.
Fortunately, her home has a large backyard with a swimming pool. There is a old rusty shed that houses all the pool and yard maintenance equipment. Hardly suitable for her for her own private she shed.
She told me that it would be nice to have a place to layout in the sun and dry off after a dip in the pool. Maybe while sipping her favorite fruity daiquiri. But, this space needs to be out of view from the people at the pool deck or at the house. Here, she privately and discretely controls her tan lines.
I needed to design a she shed to meet all these important needs that can help balance out her life between driving the kids to school functions and working 24 hour shifts in a windowless hospital.
Interior Design Solutions
Since this space is to be used only by Joslyn, she was able pick out the color scheme for the interior. Pink is her favorite color. A patterned wall paper was selected with a pink background. The horizontal lines in the wall paper helps to make the inside space appear larger than it really is.
Since she loves to watch movies and read books, a modern chaise lounge has been handpicked for her. Joslyn can relax while watching the movies from the flat screen TV on the opposite wall.
A cool addition to this she-shed would be flip top ottomans. They are so versatile and don’t take up much space. Here is my product review about flip top ottomans.
Bookshelves line up the long back wall with colorful assortment of books that add to the enjoyable color palette in the she shed.
To light up the space, wall sconces were picked out and placed between the bookshelves. Joslyn may want to add a lamp near her chaise lounge if she wants more light to read.
The large double hung windows and the French doors also allow the sunlight to stream into her personalized space suited just for her. On cool days, the air conditioner can be turned off and the windows can be opened to let in the fresh naturally conditioned air.
Roman shades are mounted upon the heads of the double hung windows. The divided glass panels with mullions complement the colonial style windows in her nearby house.
Flowing curtains at the French doors welcomes Joslyn with a flowing feminine flair.
The floor is covered with a neutral wall to wall sisal carpet. A Persian rug is placed at the entrance of the she-shed which draws the eye into the room as a splash of color.
The TV doubles as a computer monitor. A laptop can be connected to the TV monitor when wants to type out her stories on a bigger screen or watch how-to videos from her chaise lounge.
The desk is fairly small. Just the right size to type away onto her laptop when her inspirations move her.
The wall behind the desk and flat screen TV is attached to the shipping container doors. The wall will open up when the shipping container doors are opened in case Joslyn wants to expand to the side and create an outdoor yoga area or decides to move in or out furniture in the future.
It’s nice to have a space that is designed for non-anticipated expansions. Using the existing container doors in the design gave that option.
To keep the interior comfortable throughout the year, there is expandable closed cell insulation sprayed between the inside corrugated metal walls and the gypsum boards within the 2-1/2” space created by the metal studs.
The insulation will provide an R-value of around 17. The typical recommended R value for exterior walls is between R-13 and R-23. So, this should be fine.
A roof top air conditioner with a heating coil will provide more than enough conditioned air inside this modestly sized She Shed.
Another good option is to use a window unit since the space is not very large and can be easily served by one unit. It will need to be properly placed as to not to be visually unattractive.
I did not select a window unit because two walls were already used for windows and doors (including the end of the container where I left the container doors in tack).
Putting a window unit through the other walls did not seem to be a viable solution for this she shed, but maybe it would be for yours.
A high-cube 20 foot shipping container was selected so it will provide as much head room between the floor and the new painted gypsum board ceiling as possible.
Raw inside height dimension of a high-cube container is bit over 8′-10 1/2″ (8.9 ft.). With the new floor finish and ceiling, we can expect to have an 8′-6″ high ceiling from the finished floor.
Exterior Design Solution
Although Joslyn has the inside of her she shed just for her, and no one else, she wanted to have an outdoor place to sip wine with her man or occasional girl friends who come to visit.
I designed a patio outside of her she shed covered by a vine laced trellis. The siting area is furnished with outdoor furniture made of dark wicker with colorful accent pillows. Twinkly lights are woven in and around the vines over the trellis to add to the magic of this outdoor living room.
As mentioned earlier, Joslyn told me about her favorite memories and one of them was during her trip to Tuscany. This way she can have a taste of Tuscany only steps outside her back door of her house.
The patio is a built up wooden platform and it will bring the visitor up to almost the same level as front doors of her she shed.
A large indoor/outdoor rug is located over the wooden patio to better define the sitting area and to soften the space even more.
The view from her Tuscan Trellis retreat includes her pool, the back of the house, and, of course, and the exterior of her she shed.
The Exterior Walls of the She Shed
Some people like the industrial look of the shipping container. But, Joslyn wanted to only use the shipping container as the structural shell of her she shed.
She did not want to see much of the corrugated metal walls of the shipping container.
With that in mind, we decided to clad the shipping container with white composite side board.
Shipping containers are designed and fabricated to be water tight. To read more about how water tight shipping containers are and what to do when they rust at https://liveinacontainer.com/do-container-homes-rust/
To install siding upon the corrugated metal walls of the shipping container, we need to be careful not to ruin the already water tight walls when fastening the substrate and siding to the outside surfaces.
A layer of water membrane is to be placed over the exterior grade plywood substrate before attaching the siding onto the wall. This will seal around all the screws used to fasten the various layers upon the corrugated walls.
In order to keep some hint exposed that will reveal that this she shed was built with a shipping container, we left the shipping container end with the doors exposed while painting the doors pink.
Since pink is Joslyn’s favorite color and the shipping container doors are on an end that no on really sees, she did not mind having the shipping container doors exposed.
Up on the Roof
Favorite music lyrics can also help you decide what is important for your own she shed.
Joslyn really loves the lyrics sang by James Taylor and Sir Elton John. James Taylor sings, “Up on the roof” while Sir Elton sings, “I sat on the roof….” Both songs inspired us to design her upper level hide-away.
Accessed by stepping up a spiral stairs, Joslyn can hide behind a landscaped parapet and under an umbrella while sun bathing up on the roof of her she shed. The parapet gives her the privacy to catch some rays onto parts of her more modest areas while sipping on a wine spritzer complete with a fruity swizzle stick.
You Can Design Your Own She She
While Joslyn is not a real person but a composite of the many clients I have served throughout the over 30 years of designing spaces for people like Joslyn. You can be that “Joslyn” by doing this quick and fun first step:
Write down what your favorite things to do to revive away from all the daily pressures and you are well on your way to creating the perfect personal she shed just for you.
Use this a starting off point while designing your own she shed.
Go for it. You deserve it!
Credits
I designed and drew the She Shed in this article with the Sketch up Pro software. It is a user friendly CADD software that you can learn very quickly. (Its a lot easier than the CADD software I learned at I.M. Pei and Partners years ago before AutoCad became popular). I use AutoCad a lot on other projects.
Sketchup has a lot of pre-drawn images available for users and I used several of them in the Sketchup Warehouse including:
- Trellis by zamy8888
- 20 ft High cube by GT Vehicle
- Small rug by MKG Design
- beach Chair by gig60
- Windows by Marvin Windows
- French doors by Marvin Windows
- Ikea bookshelves by Pincladas 3D
- Juice glass by Dexter Ad
- Framed photos by NIRALE
- Plant and pot by tgi3duser
- Roman blinds by ACWN Designs
- Sky Dome by Nick F.
- Spiral Stairs by gig60
