Built for the job, or bought off the shelf

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The garden office has outlasted the pandemic. Here is what the rules say before you build one When offices emptied in 2020, the garden office looked like a stopgap. Six years on, it has settled into something more permanent, because hybrid working has too. The Office for National Statistics found that 28% of working adults in Great Britain were hybrid working in early 2025, with the figure far higher in sectors such as information and communication, finance and professional services. Those patterns have proved stable rather than temporary, and for many households the question has shifted from whether to work at home to where in the home that work should happen. A kitchen table serves for a few weeks. A separate building at the end of the garden offers a physical boundary between work and family life, a door that closes on a video call, and a room that can be heated only when it is in use. What permitted development allows In England, most garden buildings can be put up without a planning application under permitted development rights for outbuildings, provided they meet a set of conditions. The building must not sit forward of the front of the house. It must not cover more than half of the land around the original house. Height limits apply too: no more than 2.5 metres in total if the building is within two metres of a boundary, and otherwise no more than four metres for a dual-pitched roof or three metres for any other roof. The use matters as much as the size. An outbuilding under permitted development must be “incidental” to the enjoyment of the house. A home office used by the occupant generally qualifies. A self-contained annexe with a bedroom does not, and neither does a room used to see clients in significant numbers. Listed buildings, conservation areas and homes where permitted development rights have been removed by condition all need closer checking with the local planning authority. Building regulations are a separate question Planning and building regulations are often confused. As a general rule, a detached outbuilding under 15 square metres with no sleeping accommodation does not need building regulations approval. Between 15 and 30 square metres, it is usually exempt if it contains no sleeping accommodation and is either at least one metre from a boundary or built substantially of non-combustible materials. Anything larger needs approval. Electrical work is the area most often overlooked. Running a power supply to a garden building is notifiable work and should be carried out by a registered electrician who can certify it. Built for the job, or bought off the shelf The market divides broadly between flat-pack kits and buildings made to order. Kits are cheaper and quicker to obtain. Made-to-order buildings allow the size, window positions and insulation to be planned around the plot and around how the space will be used through winter, which is when the difference shows. In Essex, firms such as Poultons, a Danbury maker of timber buildings established in 1951, build garden offices to individual specification alongside sheds and summerhouses. Whichever route a buyer chooses, the practical checks are the same: a properly prepared base, adequate insulation in the floor, walls and roof, and enough ventilation to manage condensation. The garden office is no longer a novelty. For a sizeable share of the workforce it is simply where work now happens, and the rules governing it are worth reading before the first post goes in.