The Cosmic Shed is the location for the Cosmic Shed podcast. It's a crumbling garden shed so certainly not your usual shed of the year finalist but it does have a rather special claim to fame.
The Cosmic Shed is a podcast which explores the place where science and storytelling collide.
Now this is where it gets interesting. Guests on the Cosmic Shed include Benedict Cumberbatch, Jill Tarter (founder of SETI), Renee Horton (NASA), Col. Chris Hadfield, Beth Shapiro (How to Clone a Mammoth), Andy Weir (The Martian) and Apollo 13's Fred Haise.
Not bad for a crumbling garden shed somewhere in suburban Bristol....
The Cosmic Shed currently has about 350 downloads a day
We've put on 3 live Cosmic Sheds where we have taken over the 3D planetarium in Bristol and been joined by Professor Francesca Stavrakopoulou, Professor Bruce Hood and Professor Bruce Drinkwater to explore the science of two Star Trek films and the classic The Day the Earth Stood Still, making over two thousand pounds for charity in the process.
When I bought the house, it was a bit of a wreck but the only thing worse than it was the shed.
My friend Ben stood next to me, pointed at the shed and asked a simple question, "What on earth are you going to do with that?"
I said, "We've got 2 choices really. We knock it down or we make a podcast in it"
A coat of black paint, a host of donations from listeners and hey presto...The Cosmic Shed. Science Fact, Science Fiction and everything in between.