sciencetech-blog

comments

If an Englishman's house is his castle, his garden shed is his fortress: a refuge that has nurtured many a seedling and saved many a marriage.

But today a mere shed is not enough. Timber is so last year. So meet the £22,000 Solardome – an Eden Project for the burbs.

It's the ultimate uber-shed, a grand, permanent 20ft-across structure made from glass. Hundreds of these and similar egg-shaped conservatories are springing up around the country – and now John Lewis is about to start selling the smaller-scale £599 garden igloo.

If it's good enough for John Lewis, it's good enough for me.

Scroll down for video 

Top of the range: The Solardome, which costs a cool £22,000, is the ultimate uber-shed

Yes, its construction demands a degree of patience, if not, I'm glad to say, a degree in mechanical engineering, but this DIY dome is undeniably impressive: a 12ft-across and 7ft-tall geodesic structure made of precision-crafted, flat-packed German plastic.

Now, I don't claim to be a practical man. While I can happily whip up braised saffron sweetbreads or layer a ceviche, DIY remains a strange and alien country.

I can barely wire a plug without bringing down the National Grid. Ikea is, truly, a four-letter word.

When we first moved in together 100 years ago, my wife Deborah brought with her a set of power tools that would not have disgraced a Formula 1 mechanic. I brought my spice rack and a pastry brush.

So it was with some trepidation that, yesterday morning, I took delivery of an enormous, corpse-heavy cardboard box, dispatched – with typical Teutonic efficiency – from a Berlin factory in just 24 hours.

Step inside the Solardome geodesic glass domes

Grand: Egg-shaped conservatories are springing up around the country like the Solardome (pictured) which is a permanent 20ft-across structure made from glass 

It might be called an igloo but, much to my daughter's disappointment, you don't have to hand-carve blocks of pack ice, which would have been undeniably tricky in Dorset at the end of March.

But even with a set of faultlessly efficient instructions – the poles are all numbered, the instructions straightforward, albeit tedious – I was a worried man.

In fact, gazing at the 164 poles, all of differing lengths, and 62 connectors, I have not felt quite so fazed since being trounced in the first round of The Krypton Factor in 1992 by a postman from Peterlee. He managed to build a 6ft dice from scratch; I didn't.

A breezy promotional video shows some Beanie-hatted hipster nonchalantly putting his igloo up in just 30 minutes, but it took me two-and-a-quarter hours, slowed by the shaming fact I clearly can't tell the difference between a hexagon and a pentagon and, as a result, got two of my joints muddled up, wreaking havoc.

As my wife said tartly: 'I don't think it's meant to have a hole in the roof and a pole left over.'

Cue some furious, ill-tempered dismantling followed by a quick first-aid break as I clumsily managed to all but deglove my finger unscrewing one of these stubborn joints and spattered the white doorway with blood: not a great look.

Inspiration? The conservatories are stylistically similar to the maze featured on classic game show The Crystal Maze

There was one last glitch as my wife and I grumpily managed to slide on the skin-tight PVC cover, inside-out. This is arguably the trickiest section: imagine trying to coax a single cover over a double duvet while swearing – and sweating – under plastic.

But finally, finally, it was done. And the satisfaction was immense.

It was then time – with help from Sherborne's Castle Gardens – to dress my new man cave: an orange tree, a fig and a fern, table and chairs, a ghetto-blaster and, more crucially, a wine-cooler. 

The Garden Igloo might look funkier than your average potting shed but there is one drawback: it is completely transparent. If you're after a secret doze or a hush-hush hideaway for your home brew, this is not for you.

And it is crazily hot: a stand-up polytunnel. Certainly, my fig tree is flourishing in this sun-warmed fug, so too my oranges. Tomatoes would be perfect, so too pineapples. If you can ignore the sickly reek of new PVC, this weather-proof quasi-sauna is a little idyll.

Newly on sale in here, the manufacturers of the Garden Igloo, also called Garden Igloo, believe the UK is the perfect marketplace. Sales in Germany have been relatively modest – about 500 last year – but Chris Dimpker, head of marketing, says: 'Our product is 100 per cent weather-proof and really suits the UK. You have warmer winters and cooler summers – this multi-purpose dome is tailor-made for those conditions.'

OR TRY PUTTING UP THIS £599 MODEL?

1. Guided by the efficient instructions, after 30 minutes the base is almost complete. So far, so good.

2. I've passed the two-hour mark after muddling my connectors and slicing through a finger. Where does that top piece go?

3. I enlist my wife's help. After trying to slide the cover on inside-out, tempers fray. We're both ready for a sit-down.

4. With the igloo finally up, it's time to dress the dome: cue pot plants, a hi-fi and of course, a wine cooler.

5. Now that's more like it - a chilled sun-downer, some tunes on the ghetto-blaster and a good book.

At 12ft across, this is a roomy space to make of what you will: the perfect sci-fi housing for a paddling pool or hot tub, as long as you don't mind looking like a slightly comical extra from Blake's 7.

And, despite being incredibly strong, it's absurdly portable, hence the ten anchor poles that you will absolutely need if there is so much as a breath of wind, unless you want to see your treasured igloo disappearing over your fence like a startled jellyfish.

But this is clearly the year of the dome and the options are as variable as the prices. Luminair makes a unique canvas dome designed by an airship engineer that can be built up a tree, complete with its own solar power and a wood stove. Its prices start from £8,000.

There is even a designated camp site. Gloucestershire's Dome Garden – recently voted the UK's best glamping site – is made up of 11 vast geodesic domes.

But you could, this Easter, do a great deal worse than this budget version of the glasshouse retreat: my new dome-office-come-sweat-lodge. 

I'm about to fill the wine-cooler and I'm battening down the hatches. I may be some time.