I experienced some major house envy when I came across this fantastic backyard playhouse designed and built by Joel Henriques. I just about lost my mind, really. Joel writes the wonderful and very popular blog, Made by Joel, where you will find a long list of fun projects he has made for and with his kids. I asked him if he would share a bit about his design and building process for this modern little playhouse he constructed for them. I can only imagine how many of his kid's friends are dying to come over and have a playdate in this thing! The orange paint, the slanted roof, the hanging light - I'm loving every bit of it, aren't you? (p.s. Joel also just came out with an awesome-looking book, Made to Play! I am itching to get my hands on a copy and you should be too.)
From Joel:
"I built this playhouse a couple of years ago to utilize the space behind our garage. I'd never built anything this big before, so I kept it very simple. I used a skill saw, a handheld jig saw, and an electric drill/screwdriver for the entire thing. I remember standing in the space behind our garage and just thinking, "hmmm, about this high." then taking the measuring tape and trying to measure the space between my raised hand and the ground. It was pretty funny. I figured out window sizes and door size the same way. Very high tech."
"The floor is one piece of 4x8 foot plywood, with a frame of 2x2's supporting it underneath. The walls and ceiling are all plywood pieces and 2x2's also. I made the wall and ceiling panels separately, then attached them together with wood screws on site. The windows are plexiglass. When I bought the plexiglass sheet, they cut it for me at their shop, which made things easy. Then I handmade some wood brackets and bevels so the windows just "float" in the frame. That way I didn't have to try and drill through plexi, which can easily cause cracking. For the door, I just cut it out of the plywood sheet, then attached hinges and a door knob."
"To protect the playhouse, I used metal roofing, and coated all of the wood with a non-toxic Crystal Urethane by Timber Pro Coatings (http://timberprocoatings.com) It's held up really well. For the inside, I used some low VOC paint from Miller, and also painted part of the walls with chalkboard paint. For electricity, I just ran an outdoor extension cord from the garage to the playhouse and placed it up high under the roof, so it's away from the kids.
It gets a lot of use in the summer, and it's also been a great escape for when we need to get out of the house on rainy or even snowy days. When the kids get a little older, I'm looking forward to trying a backyard playhouse camp-out."
Thanks so much for sharing your process with us, Joel! Now if only I had a backyard...
Images courtesy of Joel Henriques
