Skip to content
Contained Living & Co

Container conversions

Container Garden Offices & Rooms

Warm, quiet and all yours: a real room at the bottom of the garden.

A ten second walk to work

Nobody planned to work at the kitchen table for good. A garden room gives you what a spare bedroom never will: a door to shut, a room that’s just for work, and a clear divide between your job and your home life. Head down the garden and you’re at work. Head back and you’re home. No packing the office away each night and no compromising the spare room.

Our garden offices are proper rooms, not sheds. The container gives you a strong, secure, weatherproof frame, and inside it we create a quiet, warm, finished room with real insulation and real glazing, smart enough to sit in front of on a video call. You gain a usable extra room without the expense, disruption and long months of an extension, and you keep every part of the house.

Comfortable whatever the weather

Insulation makes or breaks a garden room, and it’s the first thing others skimp on. Ours goes into the walls, floor and ceiling, good enough to keep the heat in through a Manchester winter and keep things pleasant in summer, and then we seal every gap against draughts. Add heating or air con and you’ll use it daily all year, not only on nice days. Large glazing, whether bi-folds, sliding doors or a picture window, lets in daylight and garden views, while the insulation quietly keeps you comfortable.

A finish that feels like home

Jack comes from kitchen fitting, with more than fifteen years of exact joinery in tight spaces where the finish is everything. A good garden room needs that same skill. Crisp reveals round the windows, tidy trims and skirting, a lining that paints up cleanly, and fitted joinery like a desk made for the wall, shelves that line up and storage that makes use of every inch. We plan the room around how you’ll use it and finish it so it looks like part of your home, not something dropped on the lawn.

We hold our own containers, so your build begins as soon as it’s agreed, not whenever a supplier is ready. That keeps waiting times short.

Planning: normally fine, but always check

In most cases a garden office or room is treated as a permitted development outbuilding, which means no planning application, as long as it’s located behind the house, is only one storey, stays low near the boundaries and covers no more than half the garden. Listed properties, conservation areas and AONBs have tighter rules.

There’s one rule that doesn’t bend: once anyone sleeps in a garden room, as a guest annexe or an Airbnb, full planning permission is needed and it has to meet Building Regulations. Offices and rooms used in the daytime usually fall below those thresholds, and a detached building under 15m² inside with no sleeping use normally doesn’t need Building Regs. The exception is the electrics: Part P covers every build, and we wire to it. We’ll explain where your build fits, and we always suggest checking with your local planning authority and thinking about a Lawful Development Certificate for extra peace of mind. (Check with your local planning authority in every case. The guidance above is for England, and Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland differ.)

Craned in and ready to work

We build the room in our workshop and it turns up complete. In most gardens it goes onto levelled pad stones, so there’s nothing to dig and no concrete to pour. A HIAB lorry lifts it over walls and fences, it’s levelled and then it’s ready. Usually it’s one day from the lorry arriving to you sitting at your desk. If getting it in looks tricky, we plan that with you well in advance.

It moves when you do. Once you’ve fitted out a garden room just how you like it, you don’t have to leave it behind.

A room you’ll actually use

Home office, studio, a quiet room for reading or space where the kids can spread out: a container garden room adds proper usable space for much less than an extension, and without the disruption. The shell is covered by our 25-year structural guarantee. Say what the room is for and we’ll handle the design, the build, the delivery and the siting, so all you do is walk in.

What’s included

  • ✓Insulation suited to all-day use, all year
  • ✓Lined with a plastered-look finish, painted to your colours
  • ✓Double-glazed window and a personnel door
  • ✓Electrics to Part P: sockets, data point, LED lights and consumer unit
  • ✓Vinyl or engineered flooring
  • ✓Draught-sealed and ready for heating

Popular options

  • +Sliding or bi-fold glazed doors
  • +Composite or timber cladding outside
  • +Heating or air conditioning
  • +Fitted desk, shelves and storage
  • +Hard-wired networking and extended broadband
  • +Green roof, canopy or decked entrance

Garden Office & Room builds

More in the gallery →
Garden office: warm, quiet & glazed

Glazed garden office, warm and quiet

Greater Manchester

Straight answers, plain English

Garden Office & Room: common questions

Will I need planning permission for a container conversion?+

Usually not, if it’s a garden building used during the day, like a gym, office, garden room, bar or studio. These normally count as permitted development, so no application is needed, as long as it meets these conditions: it sits behind the house, it’s a single storey, it’s no more than 2.5m tall where it’s within 2m of a boundary, it takes up no more than half the garden, and it has no veranda or raised platform. Listed properties, conservation areas and AONBs come with stricter rules. If anyone will sleep in it or it will be let out, full planning permission is always required. This is guidance for England, and Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own rules. Check with your local planning authority every time, and think about getting a Lawful Development Certificate if you want certainty.

Can I sleep in it, or use it as an annexe or Airbnb?+

You can, but only with full planning permission and Building Regulations approval, every time. That applies to anything slept in or let out, whether it’s an annexe for family, a holiday let or an Airbnb. Building Regs cover the insulation, ventilation, fire safety and the way services are put in. If you’re thinking about a room for sleeping, talk to us first and we’ll go through what it involves for your site. The permission itself always comes from your local authority.

Will Building Regulations apply?+

Generally not, if the building is detached, has under 15m² of floor space inside and nobody sleeps in it. From 15m² up to 30m², conditions apply, mostly to do with fire and how close it sits to a boundary. As soon as there’s sleeping accommodation, full Building Regs apply. Whatever the size, electrical work always falls under Part P, and every build we do is wired to it. Your local authority’s building control team can confirm your particular case, and you should always check with them.

Does it need foundations, and how do you site it?+

In most gardens, not proper foundations. The container is structural by itself, so we usually rest it on a basic prepared base or levelled concrete pad stones. There’s no digging and no waiting for concrete to set. If your ground is soft or on a slope, we’ll tell you what base it needs. Then the unit is craned into place, levelled and left ready to use.

How does it get delivered, and what access is needed?+

It arrives on a HIAB, which is a lorry with its own crane. The crane swings the container over walls, hedges and fences, so the lorry doesn’t have to get right up to the spot. It does need to get reasonably close, with space overhead for the crane to work. Awkward access can normally be worked around, and we talk it through with you ahead of the day so nothing catches anyone out. We deliver all over the country from Radcliffe.

Is it warm enough to use year round?+

It is. Good insulation is what turns a cold steel box into a room you can actually use, and it’s exactly where cheaper conversions skimp. We insulate the walls, floor and ceiling properly and seal out draughts, so it stays warm through a Manchester winter and comfortable in the summer. Fit heating or air conditioning and you can use it every single day of the year.

Read every FAQ

Want a garden office or room of your own?

Share your idea with us and we’ll take it from design through build to setting it down, ready to use.

We reply within one working day · Based in Radcliffe, Greater Manchester · Delivering nationwide