Building the Megaden: A Reclaimed Timber Garden Room

The Megaden started as an idea that sat in my head for years.

I had sketches, materials collected around the garden, and a rough picture of how it might eventually come together.

Eventually, I decided to actually build it.

So the Megaden is nearing completion. Standing on stilts, it's made from mainly reclaimed timber. The doors and windows we picked up from gumtree, the main supports are scaffold boards from a local farmer and the walls are finished with pallet wood.

We did have to buy some new parts for it including the roof, insulation, waterproof builders membrane, the electrics, and screws and coach bolts, but I think it's still mainly emainly reclaimed materials.

It is a whopping 3.6 meters by 2.4 meters inside. Outside has a covered deck which is another 3.6 meters by 1.7 meters.

I have to say I have loved every minute of the build. There is something so satisfying about working with wood and especially nearly free wood at that. Building something is also brilliant and gives a great sense of achievement.

So what's a Megaden? It's a place the boys and me can hang out, play games, and chill. It is a hideaway at the end of the garden that is removed from the house.

Designing the Megaden

I had many, many designs in my head before I started, I had them sketched out on paper long before I started. How big would it be? What shape would it be? how would the roof pitch, how does everything join together? How would I get electrics to it? How would I make it watertight?

A lot of the project was mentally assembled long before any timber was cut. I could already picture how the structure, roof, electrics, and layout would fit together.

Building with Reclaimed Materials

I have been collecting materials for years, squirreling away timber around the garden. The doors and windows have been lying under tarpaulins for over a year behind the shed. A length of about 30 meters of armored cable for the electrics has been hanging on my garage wall for about 15 years. It was leftover from a job my Dad did many moons ago.

The main structure sits on 100mm by 100mm by 3m long treated fence posts bolted into fence spikes and hammered into the ground. I used 8 spikes in total, one in each corner and one more each on the two longer outside runs.

With the spike and posts in place, the scaffold boards were clamped in place front and back, then drilled and secured with M10 coach bolts. Ratchet straps were used to pull the posts back into the square while the top boards were put into place.

With metal joist hangers I fitted more scaffold boards between the front and back boards to create a floor structure for both the inside and deck areas. These boards are long and heavy and give a sturdy frame really quickly.

I used reclaimed timber to make the deck from old fence boards made from pressure-treated timber.

For the inside, I put down a waterproof membrane over the joists and laid a layer of 11mm OSB.

The walls were made from CLS timber buttons, which were then clad in 11mm OSB, with a layer of builders membrane and then an outer layer of more fence boards. Inside got some foil-backed insulation before being framed inside with reclaimed pallet wood. Pallets are a real pain to dismantle and there are many videos on YouTube on how to do it quickly.

I have never had much success and is a very manual process of splitting the board and hammering out the nails. I did come up with a simpler way of taking them apart using an old car jack and spinning it up using an impact wrench. It basically just pushed the pallet boards apart with force rather than hammering. The boards had the nails removed and then sanded using a belt sander before nailing to the walls.

Learning as I Went

For the electrics, I ordered a shed/garage consumer unit from eBay. It has 2 RCB circuits on it. One for wall sockets and one for a light circuit. Amazon delivered the cable, sockets (with USB), and lights (thanks to prime).

The plan was for 3 double sockets mounted in the walls, 2 lights inside, and two lights on the deck. The boys wanted the PS3 moved into the mega den along with a TV on the wall. I wanted a mini-fridge.

My dad came down for the weekend to help with the installation. He likes this sort of work, running in cables and connecting things. I have some sort of certificate that I gained at university that I believe qualifies me for electrical installation, but that is a while ago now. I'll need to dig this out and check at some stage.

Starting with the consumer unit I had already pulled the wire armored cable in through the floor and up the cavity in the wall. Black and red and armored core as earth. We did a quick google on connection as the unit arrived with no instructions. It's basically a common neutral and common earth. The live wire goes into a master breaker which supplies the two other breakers for lights and sockets.

With a good day's work done, the electrics were commissioned and working.

Why It Was Worth Building

We have been living with the Megaden for a few weeks now and it's brilliant. Thankfully it's dry inside too as we have had a couple of sleepovers in it. The Old Sofa fits perfectly, and the PS3 has just enough wifi signal from an extender in the house.

One night there was a meteor shower, and we sat on the deck in sleeping bags at two in the morning watching meteors cross the sky through the open doors.

Looking back, moments like that were probably the real reason for building it.

In all, I would say the Megaden cost about £500 to build, which I think is quite good as it's a bit more sturdy than a run-of-the-mill summer house and hopefully will last for many years. I still need to paint it. I have the paint but need to find the time now.

Looking back, the Megaden was never really just about building a garden room.

It was about creating something from imagination, reclaimed materials, and problem solving—and ending up with a place full of memories afterwards.

This also connects closely to my thoughts on LEGO Technic and engineering mindset and how understanding structures and systems started early for me.

It links naturally to my reflections on visual thinking, especially mentally modelling projects before building them.

A lot of the same thinking also appears in my post about fixing things instead of replacing them.

I’ve always enjoyed building, fixing, and simplifying things—whether physical or digital.

A lot of the same thinking that went into the Megaden now goes into helping people untangle technical problems and improve systems.

You can take a look at my TechFix service if that sounds useful.

I Have the Maker’s Itch

I’ve always had the urge to make things.

If I see something interesting, my first thought is rarely “I should buy one.” It’s usually “How could I build that?”

Projects tend to sit in my head for weeks, months, or sometimes years before I finally start building them.

So I have an affliction with making stuff. I always have some project or other on the go. I get a whacky desire to make something and mull it over for weeks, months, or years before having to start.

If I don’t start I just keep thinking about it and thinking about it! I am either planning, making, fixing, or repurposing something. I have many projects on the go at one time.

I have to say I enjoy the whole process. I see something and think I can make one of those. I don't have much of a desire to buy it but given the chance to build or make it. How can I build that? and then I'm off.

Projects That Stay in My Head

The perfect project is something that takes a long time and has many stages to it. It can evolve and be shaped. I love to spend time subconsciously sketching out in my mind how I can make parts, how I can adapt parts, and how I can engineer something. It's those moments when I am waiting or daydreaming I will be engineering something in my head.

Looking back now, I can see this connects strongly to how I think visually. A lot of projects are mentally assembled long before anything physical gets built.

Learning Through Making

Building the boy's Jeep was a perfect example of this. It had lots of parts, it required research, it needed different types of skills and I had to adapt and repurpose things. The front steering mechanism was a problem I spent ages thinking about. I needed a way of having a 3 axis mount that could swivel in all three directions. I'd sketch out diagrams, play with bits of metal, Lie in bed awake thinking how to solve the problem. Inspiration and a final solution came while in the local hardware store. Large eye bolts normally used for gates bolted together in an X-Y-Z orientation were a quick reasonably cheap and strong solution. Relief, I can stop thinking about that problem.

The Joy of Solving Problems

Both my boys sleep in custom beds I have made. Jamie wanted a high sleeper in the shape of a Campervan, and Thomas wanted a Pirate Ship. Both required research, planning, and design. The Campervan was drawn out using a digital projector that beamed the outline of a Campervan onto a giant sheet of MDF that I then traced around with a black Sharpie.

It has working lights a real sliding door, and a surfboard as a ladder to get to the top bunk.

Thomas's Pirate Ship bed is a similar construction and has an anchor, a ship's wheel, and a bell (last orders at the bar type bell from eBay). The anchor and ship's wheel were cut out on my mini X-carve CNC machine.

I am a bit of a petrol head and one of the big projects I wanted to do was build my own car (I mentioned this in previous posts). My first attempt was to dismantle my mum's Mini Clubman estate when it was parked up after terminally failing its MOT. I didn’t get very far. I was only 12 and had a limited budget and tools. Years later I set about researching and choosing something new I could build, I had the maker's itch that needed to be scratched. It was a long project that took 4 years to build and get on the road. I took my time and enjoyed all the detailed parts of the build. Again I loved all the little projects and spent lots of time daydreaming solutions along the way.

Why I Keep Making Things

This year is no exception. I started collecting materials to make a “Mega Den" for the boys... A sheltered hangout In the garden that we can escape to, we can draw, play games, and pretend we are on holiday all while still in the garden at home. It needed to be bigger than the fort (another scrap wood project I made a few years ago).

I found some windows free from Gumtree, and some old doors also from Gumtree, and they sat under a tarpaulin for over a year as I planned out in my head how I could use them. A chance discussion with a farmer saw me collecting 12 scaffold boards and I had enough to get started.

I have spent a few happy weeks and evenings sawing, hammering, and drilling to get to the stage of something resembling a "summerhouse" no MegaDen in the back of the garden. Roofing materials arrive next week and it will be fully watertight and ready for action.

Electrics arrived this week (thanks to Amazon Prime) and a length of armored cable that I have squirreled away in the garage for over 10 years will see power running up under the grass for lights and sockets.

A couple of weeks should see it finished and that will be another project completed, and I can stop thinking about it.

There is more in the pipeline…

I have to build another Jeep. I have all the parts. The boys are bigger now and starting to outgrow the first one. I want to make something all metal and try to use the full 900W capacity of the motor's power in this one. (The Jeep currently is only using a third of that)
I need to build a double computer desk for the boys. They will have a workstation and storage each for homework and school projects

I have an Arduino Yun bought with the sole purpose of warning when the garage door has been left open and it's dark. I can’t see the door from the house unless I go outside. It has an electric opener and the plan is for it to email me to tell me it is open and from my phone, I'll be able to close it. It will involve some wiring and some code but I have planned out in my head what it needs to do. I am tempted to also connect the Arduino to a Speaker and have it play the Thunderbirds theme via WAV file when the door is opened. But that might annoy my neighbors

So yeah, I have the maker's itch and the only way to stop it is to keep on making.

I think of projects as good therapy, and if you remember that 80's kid's TV program "Why Don't You"...

P.S... top marks if anyone knows the next line?

Looking back, I think making things has always been a form of problem solving, creativity, and probably even therapy for me.

Some people switch off by relaxing. I seem to switch off by building, fixing, planning, and figuring things out.

The only real cure for the maker’s itch is to keep making.

A lot of this connects closely to my reflections on LEGO Technic and engineering mindset, where my fascination with systems and mechanisms probably began.

It also links naturally to my thoughts on visual thinking and mentally modelling projects before building them.

Many of these ideas also appear in my posts about fixing things instead of replacing them and building the Megaden.

I’ve always enjoyed building, fixing, adapting, and simplifying things—whether physical or digital.

A lot of the same mindset now goes into helping people untangle technical problems and improve systems.

You can take a look at my TechFix service if that sounds useful.