Mission Accomplished!

My first holiday project took about a week longer than I had anticipated to finish, but we wrapped it up just in time.  As we were affixing the last piece of poly film to the roof the nighttime temperature had already dropped down to freezing.

I still have some cleaning up to do around the structure, but for the most part it is 100% completed.

This new shade structure offers just under 9,000 square feet of protection for my brugmansia.  Because it was built on a slight slope, the inside height varies from 9ft tall to 12.5ft.


As you can see with this inside view, it did not take long to fill the place up.

The structure is completely covered with 30% shade cloth and wrapped with an added layer of poly film for the winter.  The poly will be removed in March.  Because the structure has a flat roof, the top layer of poly has small holes every 10-12 inches to facilitate drainage when it rains.

We had below freezing temps for over 8 hours the night we finished and the only brugs that received cold damage were the ones in my yard that were uncovered.  I plan to install a fog system inside to provide additional warmth and protection should we have prolonged freezing temperatures..

Now its time to start project #2, a 24ft x 80ft hoop style greenhouse. Unlike the shadehouse which was built from scratch, the greenhouse arrives as a kit ready to assemble.  They say it is an easy weekend project....we'll see.  :)