You Can Build Your Own Add-On Greenhouse

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On the other hand, If you decide to tackle the base of the conservatory yourself, here are a few tips to get you started:

[1] Don't make a move until you've checked out your local building codes and thoroughly understand them. Few things in our modern life are more discouraging than having an inspector tell you that you'll have to tear out something you've just built because you didn't construct it exactly to code.

And remember: Despite their seemingly nit-picking qualities from time to time, those codes are designed for your protection. If you know nothing about the frost line in your area, for instance, you may wonder why the local code specifies that all footings must be set six inches deeper into the ground than you placed yours ... until the night a hard freeze cracks your new foundation so badly that it must be replaced.

[2] The easiest way to lay out the footings for your add-on greenhouse is just the way the professionals do it: Drive stakes into the ground and run a chalk line from one marker to another to indicate where the walls of the conservatory will go.

[3] When you're satisfied that you've laid out your plant room as accurately and as squarely as possible, dig a trench two feet wide and one foot deep (or as wide and as deep as your local construction code dictates) along the perimeter of the proposed site.

[4] The concrete footings themselves—which should be a minimum of eight inches wide—can then be "formed up and leveled" in this trench. You can make your own forms from 3/4-inch plywood ... or rent prefabbed forms from a local rent-all, contractor, or cement supplier.

[5] The footings should be reinforced—again, to code—with steel rods or "rebar" tied together both horizontally and vertically inside the foundation forms before the concrete is poured.

[6] Remember to leave 1/4- to 1/2 inch "D" anchor bolts protruding from the top of the poured footings—and spaced to match the bearing plate and/or vertical posts that will fasten to them—so that the walls of your addition can later be securely attached to the room's foundation. You should also remember to leave two-inch drainage holes—spaced about four feet apart—in the foundation of the lean-to greenhouse.

[7] Once the footings are in and have cured sufficiently, remove their forms and backfill the foundation with gravel and/or dirt in accordance with local codes. You may also have to install tile or gravel drainage channels leading away from the drain holes that you left through the footing walls.

CONSTRUCTION: FLOORING

The floor of your conservatory—if you make it concrete—must be leveled and formed up in much the same way that the room's foundation was. Dig out the whole area where the concrete is to be poured so that—when the surface of the finished floor is the height you want it—there will be room for at least four inches of concrete and four inches of gravel between that surface and the dirt underneath.

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