Total Sheds
Design Inspiration · 6 min read
Garden bar ideas from a UK shed maker: three routes to a back-garden pub, the sizes that actually work, power and security sorted, and a proper name.
Your New Local
Three honest routes to a pub at the bottom of the garden, plus the sizes, kit and security that make it actually work.
The best local in Britain has no queue at the bar, no telly showing someone else's match, and no bell for last orders — because it's twenty steps from your back door. A garden bar is the happiest thing you can do with a shed — and we've been making garden buildings in our West Midlands workshop since 1995, so we've seen a few. Here's how to do it properly.
Our dedicated Bars range is designed as a pub from the first panel — a proper serving hatch, a bar front to lean on, FSC-certified timber on tanalised framing.
A summerhouse is halfway there: the glazing gives you light, and the wide opening makes a natural bar front. Pin the doors back and you've got a pub terrace.
Place the door and windows panel by panel, exactly where the bar layout wants them, with an internal partition splitting off a store room for the crisps.
Start with the counter. A bar top wants around 60cm of depth — drip tray, ice bucket, two sets of elbows — plus standing room in front. That maths gives you two honest layouts:
Before you fix where the opening goes, watch where the six o'clock sun lands: a west-facing hatch means sunset pints. Our Bars range puts the serving front where the design intends, a summerhouse gives you a whole glazed side to play with, and in the Build Studio you put the door and every window exactly where the evening light says.
One boring-but-important note: a garden bar counts as a garden building, so it's normally permitted development — the usual catch being 2.5m maximum height within 2m of a boundary. Full picture in our planning guide.
Five jobs, in order. Only one needs a professional.
Bars range for speed, summerhouse for light, Build Studio when you want the layout exactly yours — including a partition to hide the stock room.
Tip: Sketch where people will actually stand on a busy evening. The route that fits the sketch wins.
Fridge, lights and music mean a proper outdoor supply — armoured cable from the house and a small consumer unit. Book it before the décor goes up, not after.
Careful: Garden electrics are notifiable Part P work. A registered electrician signs it off; an extension lead through the kitchen window does not.
Build the counter around 60cm deep with a hinged serving hatch above it. Prop it open on good days; drop it at night.
Tip: Hinge the hatch at the top so it opens upwards — instant awning, and rain runs straight off.
Warm LED strips under the counter and shelves inside; festoons strung outside over the seating, on a timer or dusk sensor.
Tip: Warm white everywhere. Cool white makes a bar feel like a dentist's waiting room.
Think like a landlord at closing time: lockable shutter over the serving front, solid hasp and padlock on the door, good bottles out of sight.
Careful: A stocked bar is a target. Lock it as carefully as you filled it.
You don't need much — pubs are built from small, correct details:
People, a kettle and a fridge all pump moisture into a small building, so give it cross-flow ventilation — vents on opposite walls, so air moves through instead of sitting damp. Overhead, an EPDM rubber roof shrugs off British weather for decades, so the party never stops for a re-felting weekend.
A stocked bar is worth stealing, so design the quiet side too: a windowless rear elevation gives passers-by nothing to browse. Our Security Sheds show that thinking taken all the way.
No garden pub is finished until it's named. The Shed Arms is the timeless classic; The Dog & Trowel, The Fence & Firkin and The Nag's Shed all await a landlord. Paint it on a hanging sign, and add house rules — optional, but traditional.
No — not for private use. Free drinks for family and friends in your own garden need no licence at all. It's selling alcohol that's regulated: charge money, even at a party, and you're into licensing territory. Keep it your round and the law leaves you alone.
Usually not. A garden bar is treated like any other garden building — normally permitted development, the key limit being 2.5m maximum height within 2m of a boundary. Listed buildings and conservation areas carry extra rules.
Yes — the fridge, lights and music depend on it. Outdoor electrics are notifiable Part P work, same as any garden building: a registered electrician runs armoured cable from the house and signs the job off. The one step we'd never DIY.
Check the climate class. Many kitchen fridges misbehave below about 10°C, so choose a model rated for garages and outbuildings; keep the building ventilated and it'll pour cold ones in January.
Design first, gadgets second. A lockable shutter over the serving front, a solid hasp with a closed-shackle padlock on the door, a windowless rear wall, and the spirits out of sight of any glazing. What can't be seen rarely gets tried.
Pin this to the door before your first session.
Browse purpose-built garden bars, made in our West Midlands workshop from FSC-certified timber, with free UK mainland delivery.
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