Aluminium Garden FurnitureGarden Furniture Design

I would like to take a minute to draw your attention to this clever piece of furniture. Essentially, it is a Monk’s Bench, but it is designed to withstand the elements and stay outside!

For those of you who haven’t heard of a Monk’s Bench before; they are basically wooden benches that have a storage area inside of them – presumably originally for storing monk-ly stuff like Bibles, spare robes and secret stashes of biscuits… Whatever their original purpose however, my dad owned one when I was a youngster and he used it to store all manner of sports equipment in; leading me to conclude that the idea of making a Monk’s Bench into a piece of garden furniture is a fantastic one!

I’m not saying we should all go out and replace our garden sheds with benches, but what I am saying is that extra storage area outside is never something to be sniffed at – especially when it looks as stylish as this! Personally I would use it for storing BBQ-equipment; charcoal, tongs and skewers primarily. Not firelighters though, that’s an accident waiting to happen. Now I think about it, charcoal and a variety of stabbing-equipment might actually be exactly what monks stored in their benches…depends whether you believe the details of the Spanish Inquisition I suppose…