Garden Room Workshop: Part 1. Introduction & Garage demolition transcript

I wanted a wood workshop in my garden to store all my DIY tools and to be able to work on projects all year round. I did have an existing garage that I looked at insulating but its best days were most definitely behind it. There was subsidence in one corner which had in turn cracked the concrete floor and the walls. The garage door was lopsided and the roof area had caved in so I decided that the whole thing had to go!

I had an idea of replacing it with a new timber-framed workshop and looked into cost. For the size I wanted, roughly 30m2 (about 320 square feet), the companies that supply them charge from upwards of 20 thousand pounds. So I decided I would design and build my own. I researched for months the best techniques and youtube was a great help but they were mainly montages showing the building going up, but not the thought processes, the materials used, the difficulties or the costs.

For my own build I wanted to show all of these things in a step by step guide for anyone to build their own. Just to be clear, I am no tradesman, just an over-enthusiastic DIYer. The first task was to remove the consumer unit from the garage and the wiring with it. I wrapped this up in layers of plastic and used duct tape to prevent any exposure to moisture. I then purchased a sledgehammer and went to work on the attached greenhouse and the flat roofed room behind it.

By working from the top downwards, the single brick walls came down very quickly. Next I removed the roof tiles, saving as many as possible to sell later on so I didn’t have to dispose of them myself. I can tell you this stage goes a lot faster if you have a second person on the ground to pass them to! But, when working alone I stacked them on the edge and then brought them down later on. To lift the roofing battens I used a crow bar working from the top down.

Working back and forth I loosened each nail until the batten came off. This was definitely the most precarious stage so I took great care to step only where the rafters were. I set to work removing the rafters. Using a reciprocating saw I cut the header between each truss so I could take them down individually. The best method that I found was to push them out and then downwards so that they worked themselves loose. As the windows were already loose, this made it easy to get a metal cutting blade in to cut the screws holding it in place.

So now we can clearly see the site for where the new workshop will be. The area at the end here was completely wasted space before as you can see in this previously taken photo so that will now be put into good use. So the final thing in this video is to tackle the concrete so I went down to Screwfix and picked up the Titan breaker. I had thought about hiring but it’s incredibly hard work so I spread it out over a couple of weeks and I definitely recommend buying one or at least getting one second-hand instead.

This has happened to me a couple times, the main breaker point, let’s call it the vampire stake, would get stuck so I’d have to change over to the chisel point in order to get it out. I know I said that I did this demolition single-handedly but here I had a little help from Matilda who didn’t seem phased at the prospect of beheading! Lastly, I had a bonfire of the scrap wood from the garage and I rewarded her hard work with some wood-ash to dust-bathe in.

I hope you enjoyed that, do stay tuned for the part 2 where I look at the design of my workshop and explore planning permission and building regs. See you next time!