Shepherd huts and planning permission: a day at Purton Barn's open day

Planning permission is the question that decides whether a shepherd hut project happens or not, and it is the one question that rarely gets answered at a show. So we spent the day at Purton Barn's open day answering it.

Purton Barn build luxury handcrafted shepherd huts in Wiltshire, a lot of it from reclaimed materials, and the standard of the work speaks for itself. The huts were open, the BBQ was on, there was Hawkstone in the fridge, and people came from across the region to have a proper look at what they were buying. Some had a site in mind already. Some were still working out whether the idea stacked up at all.

We were there for a simple reason. When someone stands inside a hut and starts picturing it on their own land, the very next question is a planning one. Where can it go? Do I need permission? How long does it take? Will the council go for it? Those questions don't usually get answered at a show, because the person who makes the hut isn't the person who gets the consent.

So we sat in on those conversations all day.

The planning questions landowners actually asked

We spoke to a lot of attendees about their own projects, and the range was wider than we expected.

There were farmers looking at three or four units in a corner of a field as a second income. A couple of wedding venues wanting on-site accommodation so guests stop leaving at eleven. Estate managers with a redundant yard and no clear idea what to do with it. And a fair few private homeowners after a garden office or an annexe for a relative.

Different projects, same sticking point. Most people had a rough sense that planning would be involved, but no real sense of whether their particular site would pass, what evidence they'd need, or what it would cost them to find out.

Do you need planning permission for a shepherd hut?

The short answer we gave most people is yes, probably, and it depends far less on the hut than on what you plan to do with it.

A hut used as ancillary space in your own garden is a very different application from three huts let out to paying guests on agricultural land. The second is a change of use, and that is what the council will actually be assessing. Whether the hut has wheels, whether it's classed as a caravan, and whether any temporary use rights apply are all worth checking, but they're rarely the thing that decides the outcome.

What decides it is the site. Access and highways. Landscape designation. What the land is currently used for. Flood risk. Whether anything similar has been approved nearby, and on what grounds the council refused the ones that weren't.

That's why a generic answer is close to useless, and why we'd rather look at your site than talk in general terms.

Giving people a straight answer on the day

Our job on the day wasn't to sell anything. It was to give people enough of a steer that they could go and have a serious conversation about buying.

That meant looking at what they described, asking the questions that actually matter, and telling them honestly where we thought it would land. In a few cases that was “yes, that should be very doable, here's the likely route”. In others it was “that specific corner of the field is going to be difficult, but move it two hundred metres and you've got a much better case”.

And once or twice it was “we don't think that's going to fly, and here's why”. Nobody enjoys hearing that, but it's better heard over a burger and a beer than eighteen months and several thousand pounds later. If a project isn't likely to succeed, we say so upfront. That's how we've always worked.

What we noticed is how much that changed the tone of the conversation next to the huts. People stopped asking “could this ever work?” and started asking “which model, and how many?”. That's a very different buying conversation, and it's a far more useful one for the manufacturer too.

A free site assessment for every attendee

We've offered every attendee we spoke to a free initial site assessment, no obligation.

That's a proper look at the site rather than a phone call. We take the location, the constraints, the local planning history and what you're actually trying to achieve, and come back with a view on whether it's viable, where the units should sit, and what the route to planning consent looks like. If it's straightforward, we'll tell you. If it isn't, we'll tell you that too.

For anyone who came to the open day and hasn't heard from us yet, the offer stands. Get in touch and we'll get it booked in.

Why hut and pod manufacturers should have a planner on site

“Having a planning consultant on site at the open day changed the whole shape of our conversations. Normally we'd get a great response to a hut, then radio silence for weeks while someone tried to figure out if their site would even get consent. This time people got a straight answer on the spot, and the ones who were viable moved straight into talking numbers with us. It's the closest we've come to turning enquiries into orders in real time.This is the model we'd like to see more of.” - Kingsley - Purton Barn

Manufacturers build superb buildings. What they shouldn't have to do is answer planning questions on a customer's behalf, chase a council, or watch a confirmed order stall because the site turned out to be a non-starter. That's our end of it.

Having us on site meant every planning question got a real answer within a minute of being asked, rather than a “you'd need to check with the council”. Enquiries turned into serious conversations faster, and the ones that were never going to work got flagged early instead of sitting in a pipeline for six months.

If you build shepherd huts, pods, cabins or lodges and you'd like the same setup at your next open day or show, we'd be glad to talk about it. We handle the planning so you can get on with building.

Get in touch

Thinking about shepherd huts on your land, adding accommodation to a venue, or a garden building at home? We'll tell you straight whether it's likely to get planning permission.