DIY pod-building projects
If you’ve got previous building experience and tools, you can easily build your own Backyard Pod as a DIY building project. We’ll work with you on your basic design and kit specifications. Once underway, you’ll get the complete set of instructions including step-by-step videos and engineering documentation. No worries if you get a bit stuck along the way or need further explanation – we have an expert pod installer available to provide you with phone support. Join the large number of handy homeowners who have completed their own granny flats, backyard studios, home offices, sleepouts, storage rooms, workshops, etc. If your project is exempt, you can get started straight away. If your project will need approval, we can help you there too.
Project designs and examples
You'll find Backyard Pods tucked away in quiet corners of the countryside and coastal areas of NSW, VIC, and QLD. This rustic off-grid cabin on a large lakeside block in a small Victorian coastal hamlet is what some dreams are made of. As a tiny house with a wood heater, kitchenette, and external off-grid facilities, lined with Scandi-style plywood interior, it's someone's hidden gem.
Rural properties often evolve over time – perhaps starting with a small cabin and growing with enclosed verandas and outbuildings (sometimes over generations) until the homestead ideal is fully expressed. Our customer on acreage in the Southern Tablelands added a cozy double-glazed home office as a DIY building project – well done!
In a suburban backyard near Brisbane, one time-poor husband became a hero at home by building his wife a fully-certified yoga and meditation retreat as a weekend DIY project using a 3m x 5m kit from Backyard Pods.
David and Mark have a beautiful property not far from Ballina in northern NSW, where they provide family respite accommodation. They had one respite cabin on the property, made from an upcycled mining donger (pre-used demountable building). But when the time came to create a second and even better cabin, their options were limited. Their property is nowhere near a capital city and the site is difficult for trucks to access, so any kind of prefab kit home would have been totally unsuitable.
Man-caves are a tremendously popular idea (or she-sheds, whatever you want to call them). Here is a simple man-cave in Canberra made using a Backyard Pod kit 3m x 6m, our most popular size of all-time. Sometimes a Backyard Pod needs no real purpose, it's just a great extra space to hang out and do your own thing.
The ‘extra space’ dilemma is solved on a rural acreage in Central West, NSW when a DIY Backyard Pod features many energy-efficient, environmentally-friendly materials and is powered ‘off-the-grid’ to become a potential combination guest sleep-out and home office.
Sharon’s elderly mother had a final wish – that her daughter would have a place to call her own. It followed for Sharon to build a low-cost granny flat on her son’s property at Mount Tamborine on Queensland’s Gold Coast. Sharon's granny flat has a custom kitchen and sewing room.
With basic construction skills and attention to compliance, you can save on your Backyard Pod with DIY. This prospect appealed to a family living in a suburb of Canberra. They needed versatile studio space to suit the various needs of a couple and three children. How did they achieve their plans?
Take a look at how a Toongabbie local transforms a basic Backyard Pods kit 3m x 6m into his finished DIY storage pod within just a few days.
