Because sheds aren't just for men—this selection of sheds from North America, the UK, and Europe shows how women everywhere can claim and use their own personal space.

Every woman deserves a shed of her own, somewhere to retreat to for some quiet time, to create or grow, to write or paint, or just to contemplate the view. Gill Heriz has interviewed over 80 different women, and Nicolette Hallett has photographed their sheds inside and out, to collect together this unique insight into why women have sheds, and what they do in them. There are sheds for puppet-makers, sculptors, and writers, as well as farmers, furniture-makers, and woodcutters. There are sheds that can be lived in, sheds that are full to the rafters, and sheds that are simply sheds, with the usual collection of gardening tools, lawnmowers, and seed packets. Virginia Woolf once argued that, for women, writing fiction required “a room of one’s own.” These women have taken that premise a step further—into the backyard—to find their own very personal space.