Doing your homework

When I moved house 10 years ago, I was the only person in the street who worked from home. Today my homeworking neighbours include another journalist, a book editor, a translator, a violin maker, a solicitor, a textile designer and a stained-glass artist. The upside of this change is that the street is a more sociable place to live; on the downside there are now queues in the delicatessen at lunchtime.

Every year growing numbers of us are giving up commuting, canteens and office gossip in exchange for working from home. Recent research from The Henley Centre predicts that by 2006 more than 30 per cent of the UK workforce will be working from home some or all of the time.

It can be one of the best moves you'll make in life, taking control of your time, your workload and your work environment. But if you want to earn a living, working from home is no soft option. It requires discipline and self-sufficiency in working alone for days at a time.

One of the keys to getting it right is to make sure your home office is a welcoming and inspiring place where it is enjoyable to work. It doesn't need to take up a huge amount of space, but if you take your work seriously, then take your office seriously and don't think you can get away with perching on the edge of a table.

Of course, everyone's needs will be different, but in setting out to work from home there are five first steps to take:
Work out how much space you need to do your job efficiently.
Decide whether you have enough room or can make enough room to work at home.
Feel confident that you can earn a living and think hard about whether you will be happy working alone.
Calculate how much it will cost to set up a basic office.
With these basics in place, set to work collecting design ideas to create an office which suits you and your job.

Things to avoid include:
Messy offices without clear boundaries that literally spill over into your home life .
Using your home phone line for business calls.
Thinking that you can combine full-time working with child care. Both will suffer.
Spending large sums of money at the outset on equipment you may not need.
Backlogs of paperwork, especially tax-related records, which can spiral out of control, leaving you with serious financial debt.

Daniel Johnston, Barrister

After being based in busy and cramped law chambers, Daniel Johnston, a barrister, decided that to gain more space and peace he would bring his office home. A sunny spare bedroom with garden views has become his tranquil new workplace, pictured above. While the design is based on the traditional study, it is refreshingly removed from the stereotype of the barrister's cluttered chambers.

The challenge was to accommodate the huge volume of paperwork, which Formwork Architects has achieved by lining the room with cupboards and shelving. Built in a slender, birch-faced marine plywood, the bespoke units are based on a cube module the size of Johnston's files. Filing drawers wrapped round the base of the room are designed to accommodate foolscap-size documents. Nice details include the small recessed handle cut from the face of the drawer; there are no protruding handles to disturb the sheer face of the units.

The desk was found in a high-street furniture store, its colour an almost perfect match for the ply. Open shelves lighten the physical impact of the desk in its position against the window. Because Johnston prefers to keep the garden view uninterrupted, his desktop is kept clear except for a task light and an in-tray and is used only for writing. A separate computer bench is fitted at one side of the room.

Design by Formwork Architects (020 7266 5723).

Rosemary Fraser, writer

Most people use the shed at the bottom of their garden for tools or storage, but writer Rosemary Fraser wanted more than that: a place where she could read, think and write. Friends recommended architect Sarah Wigglesworth and the pair talked through dozens of ideas. No drawings were produced for weeks as client and architect surrounded themselves with piles of architecture books and magazines, and gradually the design (pictured left) emerged as a cross between a grown-up Wendy house and a garden shed.

The construction materials couldn't be simpler. It's built with sheets of Douglas fir plywood fixed on a timber frame. The same plywood is used inside and out. The desk is the focus of the room, with its generous surface jutting into the garden and framed in glass. More light comes in through the horizontal band of glass at the top of the wall. Along the back wall are built-in cupboards for storage, a tiny kitchen and a daybed for dreaming and thinking. To keep clutter to a minimum Rosemary has imposed a strict work discipline and starts and ends the day with a clear desk. Each morning she carries into the space only those materials she needs - including portable computer and printer - for the project in hand. To focus the mind there is no telephone, no way of hearing the house doorbell and no visitors.

Design by architect Sarah Wigglesworth (020 7607 9200).

Suzsi Corio, textile designer

One of the most appealing features of architect Nik Randall and textile designer Suzsi Corio's converted Victorian school, pictured above and right, is the natural sunlight flooding in. Randall's architecture practice has transformed the large, open-plan space into a home for the couple and their young son, Louis, with a workplace for Suzsi, who had been based in a small studio but wanted to work from home after the arrival of her child. The change saves her two hours of commuting a day and lets her work flexible hours.

The kitchen and dining room are open right up to the rafters, but above the sitting area a floating mezzanine floor holds Suzsi's new studio. Her work involves designing and making samples of woven cloth and embroidery patterns for large fashion houses. Big skylights give lots of light for the close-knit work and open up onto a lovely roof terrace. The tools of her trade include computerised electronic knitting machines and a personal computer for designing and office administration. Work benches are fitted along three sides of the space with the central area free. One of the most striking elements of the design is the see-through, glass-panel floor. It enables light to flow into the room below and makes it possible for Suzsi to keep an eye on Louis as he plays.

Design by Brookes Stacey Randall Architects (020 7403 0707).

Nigel Smith, architect

When architect Nigel Smith saw the empty shell of his fifth-floor loft space, the shafts of natural light and panoramic views of London sold it to him immediately. Now the big open-plan living room has become the hub of home and working life. Where most people might have tried to disguise their home office or tuck it away in a corner, Smith took the bold decision to place his desk in a prime position, just offcentre in the space and close to one of the huge windows. He reasoned that since he worked at home, there was no point hiding the fact, and that if work was to be enjoyable and very much a part of his life, then it should be incorporated into the living space.

The design of the office hinges on the quartet of contemporary-style desks, which fit together to make an enormous workstation. Below the work surface there's generous storage space in filing cabinets, while rising through the middle are platforms for the computer monitor, task lights and any small items in regular use. Swing-out arms carry the telephones, and all cabling is fed directly to floor sockets. Smith's interest in collecting classic modern furniture led him to buy an elegant chrome and leather work chair designed by Charles and Ray Eames, the design duo who produced the shaped plywood chairs that double as dining and conference-table furniture.

Design by architect Nigel Smith (020 7278 8802).