How many times have you thought about setting up your own Therapy Space for a healing practice at home?    Are you keen to break away from a full time role working for someone else and follow your passion for counselling,  CBT  (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) psychotherapy or art and music therapy?   As a new venture, the absolute best way to promote your professionalism, create a private therapy space and reduce the impact of your business (taking over the ground floor!) of your home; is a garden studio.

If you’re a homeowner and you’ve got adequate garden space, you can secure a small to mid-sized insulated garden studio from around £15,000 to £50,000.00 dependent on your chosen manufacturer, the building type, functionality and the extras specified (Underfloor heating, for example).

If you don’t happen to have a spare £15-50k sitting in your bank account, you can always lease a building (because buildings such as ours are relocatable) or you may find that you get a more favourable rate from your mortgage provider as a 2nd charge.

There may be tax BENEFITS to installing a therapy space as a ‘garden office’ (although we try our best to check these facts we would *always* advise that you check with your accountant first):

if:

• you’ve registered a ltd. company and it’s VAT registered you may be able to claim the full amount of VAT back
• You could offset the cost of integral features, assets and equipment as a capital allowance
• You’re eliminating the costs of rent and business rates at a commercial premises and increasing the value of your home simultaneously

The first step towards your own therapy space may be to investigate these factors:

• How much space is available in your garden and whether there may be any restrictions on your land
• Consider that Permitted Development Guidelines may restrict the height of and where you site your building (no less than 2m from the boundary if your building is over 2.5m high) Guidelines are available at the  —-> Planning Portal
• The aesthetics of your building – would it suit it’s purpose? Do you envisage a sleek  urban building or a rural, rustic lodge style garden studio?
• The amount of light required within the space
• How you may fund the building  —-> The Funding circle and leasing packages are available for small businesses
• Whether you could re-locate your therapy space when you move house
• How you might use the space if you decide not to use it as a Therapy Room in the future (granny annexe? Games Room? Art Studio)
• Whether you have the option of running the plumbing up to the site for a W/C or shower or whether you’d prefer your clients use the house
• The sound-proofing requirements of your new Garden Therapy Space
• Access requirements and disabled access requirements

If you’re serious about having your own therapy practice and therapy room in your garden you may already be thinking about how you may heat it, whether a small crackling log burning stove would be the ideal addition for a relaxing experience (perhaps with psychotherapy or counselling) or hidden Underfloor heating for studios which may be suitable for Yoga Room or QiGong centre.

If you’re a Reflexologist you may require chairs and furniture.  Psychotherapists may seek out a Garden Building with integrated shelving units and storage for sand-play figures, trays and props.

You may find that you wish to set-up your therapy practice in a garden room initially but move to larger premises once you’ve expanded your client base and take it to a new level.  What would you then do with your garden therapy room? Turn it into a Teenagers den, games room for the husband or GRANNY ANNEXE?

These considerations are worth taking into account as you design the layout/door positioning and size and orientation of the windows.

Once you’ve spoken to your accountant/partner/friends/advisers and decided that Garden Therapy Space is definitely the way ahead for you the next step is to find the building of your dreams (We see few as dream-worthy as the mighty Rotunda!) and call the manufacturer for a non-obligation site survey and personalised quotation.  Most garden building manufacturers and building firms will spend at least an hour with you discussing the finer details / your vision and checking the suitability of your site.  When you’ve decided on the finishes, windows, heating, orientation and the style of building you’re investing in you should receive a full itemised quotation and design drawings prior to having to make any form of commitment.
If you’d like to see an example of how one passionate therapist makes use of a 3.5m Rotunda “Bumble” (which is now about three years old) it’d definitely be worth you popping over to the website of Elizabeth Grover @ The Garden Sanctuary.