Garden room comparison: Garden Retreats vs Modern Garden Rooms

You wouldn’t believe just how much the right garden room can do for you and your home. Demand for these versatile structures is only increasing, as they not only expand the amount of usable space on your property but are also highly customisable and suitable for a variety of applications.

You may wish to have a garden office, workout space, homeschooling classroom or space to run your business. You have the opportunity to create a magnificent garden building that not only compliments your home’s character but allows you the space to be creative and productive, away from the distractions of your main house.

However, with the urgency for your own perfect garden room comes the difficult decision—where is the best place to purchase one? This article will compare Garden Retreats and Modern Garden Rooms across key features involved with the manufacturing of garden rooms, to help you find the best one for you and your home.

Garden Retreats and Modern Garden Rooms: Summary

The main similarities between Garden Retreats and Modern Garden Rooms

Fixtures and fittings internally included

When you purchase a bespoke garden room from either manufacturer, all the fixtures and fittings such as the lights, switches, plug sockets are all internally included. The exception, however, is that Garden Retreats also have air-con and smartphone-controlled heating included with each purchase on top of everything else.

Similar use potential

A garden room should extend the functionality of a regular extension or outbuilding like a conservatory, orangery, log cabin or summerhouse.

Garden rooms from both Garden Retreats and Modern Garden Rooms are suitable for a similar list of applications. This includes use as an office space, homeschooling classroom, play or games room, studio for photography, painting or fitness, pet grooming or beauty salon and much more.

The main differences between Garden Retreats and Modern Garden Rooms

Structural design

Modern Garden Rooms offer five different ranges of garden buildings: Canopy Room, Concave Room, Cube Room, Rendered Room and Border Room. These ranges are pre-constructed and come as they are shown.

Garden Retreats pods use a modular design system of three individually-priced, different sized pods that you can choose between to install individually or combine to create a larger structure. Because of this modularity, you can take your pod with you if you move to a new home, and even add more pods if you need the extra space.

External walls/cladding materials

Modern Garden Rooms build their garden rooms with a multi-layered timber wall construction and timber cladding. This cladding will fade to become a more grey hue over time, meaning it will require routine maintenance in order to keep its natural colour.

At Garden Retreats, we construct our garden rooms using glass fibre and carbon fibre frames and cladding made from composite material in black, white or natural. This means the structure will not deteriorate or expand, nor will the cladding cause condensation—requiring zero maintenance without compromising on aesthetics or quality.

Internal walls and flooring

Modern Garden Rooms use a multi-layered system for their walls, which are finished with plasterboard and plaster skim coating that you can paint once it’s dry (which takes up to two weeks). All of their buildings come with oak-laminated flooring as standard.

No plaster is used on the walls of Garden Retreats pods. Our buildings come with wall panels which are fire-proof, scratch-proof and long-lasting. They are available in six colour options, or you can upgrade to bespoke panels and create a feature wall using your own high-res images or logos. You also have a huge selection of Italian luxury vinyl flooring tiles to choose from, giving you the freedom to pick the best design that suits your personal taste.

Optional add-ons

Optional add-ons from Modern Garden Rooms include timber or composite decking and additional interior features such as underfloor heating, dividing walls, timber door sets and extra lights, electrical sockets and heaters.

Garden Retreats also offers external composite decking in a choice of three colours to match the cladding of your luxury garden room, along with a roof terrace that has a spiral staircase leading down. These can be included during your initial installation, or added later on if you decide your pod needs an extra touch of luxury.

Benefits of the Garden Retreats pod

The materials used to construct a Garden Retreats pod require 75% less energy to produce and transport than steel. This way, we are not only providing a durable and high-quality structure for you to use for years to come, but also lessening our impact on the environment. These materials are designed for zero external maintenance, meaning your Garden Retreat will need no repairs, replacements or regular repainting.

Our pods have an industry-leading British warm roof system with a U-value of 0.18. This superior thermal efficiency guarantees that your energy is used as efficiently and cost-effectively as possible.

We promise to have your garden room installed as swiftly as possible, ready for your use in a matter of days, not weeks or months. All electrics, smartphone-controlled heating and air-con are included, and come with their manufacturer warranties.

Finally, we believe you should be able to configure your Garden Retreat to suit your own creative vision, rather than being stuck with a set décor or design. That’s why we give you a choice of six wall panel colours and 19 floor tiling styles to choose. We also offer bifold or patio doors for the main entrance of your garden room, in either black or grey for a touch of modern elegance.

To find out more about our luxury Garden Retreats or to book a free site survey, get in touch with a member of our team today.