Post #763586 by lavish88 on Tue, May 10, 2016 12:43 AM

Aloha from Weston Super Mare here in the SW of England , not exactly a Tiki hotspot so I decided to change that and here are the fruits our our labour so far.
The previous owner had let it all go to hell over the last 6 years including this hot tub/Sauna/bar area which by now was past redemption and a health hazard so it had to go.

After much hard work and digging out tons of concrete we got i back to something like a garden

Rita wanted a water feature and the idea was to turn this end in to a kind of secret garden

with cascading conch shells,ceramic Gaudi type structures etc which would have been lovely but then I had a rare moment of clarity...... TIKI BAR!
from then the idea snowballed and the plan was to build this spring to have it ready for summer , well the plan is on track despite the weather ,so here goes.I've been lurking here 6 months and finally have something to post .

I came up with this design based on practicality/budget etc ,We live close to the sea and the garden is very ,very windy at times so I figured a decorative thatch roof would take a battering so I went for the practical option and sloped it backward so as not to see any ugly roofing and spend more time and money on the interior ceiling - heres a rough sketch up of what fitted into the trapezoid shaped end of the garden.

Building Regs limit it to 98 " within 6 feet of a shared wall so that put a limit on height - its 97.99 inches high at the moment , in retrospect maybe it should have been lower but lets see when its finished.

First thing was Rita's idea of putting down a fake lawn which we did with the help of her grandson Dylan and his army of dinosaurs.

Then assembling the walls and bar front and finally the roof structure , was a bit tricky on my own levelling everything as it slopes 3 inches left to right and 2 inches back to front but managed it in the end.

As i'm doing this on my own a lot of the time things had to be in bite sized chunks so I split the roof into 5 panels which I was confident of fitting myself with underslung bracing etc and then to cover over the joins with bamboo poles .I added a bitumen sheeting roof and three coats of weatherproofing which was time consuming as it rained most days in April with the odd hailstorm for good measure.

I went up to Cheeky Tiki in London to choose the matting for the walls and ceiling and got their last two sheets of wide Lauhala which was what I wanted and after three days in the back of my car there were a few issues with getting it to flatten out but once rolled out and left in the sun this turned out fine.

I had Ritas help for a couple of days so we started with the small bits on the columns

Its the first time I've worked with it so was a bit nervous but it worked fine with spray contact adhesive and a roller to flatten out plus an excellent tip I found on here of putting duct tape on the back of the cutting line so it doesnt fall apart when cut.
Roof panels were cut and clad off site.

and then screwed in to the roof joists whilst the bamboo for the roof was being sanded, stained and burnt .I used a spirit based stainer and varnish in light oak and it turned out fine

Rita built a raised bed with sleepers and planted bamboo to add to the vibe , many more plans for planting , a friend also donated 20 bamboo poles, 5 inch diameter and 8 feet long so I'll use them in this space eventually.

I drilled the bamboo and fixed the front to back poles with 6 inch bolt screws and left them hanging down so I could lash on the underslung poles and then screwed the whole lot hard to the ceiling to hide the matting joins, I'm pleased with the result and it all went to plan.

I've added bamboo to the front and sides and am also staining up the back bar shelves and bar tops every day weather permitting .

Sadly work will take me away from all this fun for a few weeks but I'll try and update when I can .
As someone with basic woodworking skills and no experience of using bamboo/matting etc I really couldn't have got this far without Tiki Central.
Thank you all for the knowledge and inspiration.
Regards,
Mark.

PS The Lavish Lounge is a work in progress name , it will have to incorporate mine and Ritas when we final come up with something less obvious than 'Mark and Ritas Tiki Shack' ....no rush on that though.

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