4.) Amy Bloom – Self-employed author in Durham, Conn. (amybloom.com)

Like many home-based business owners, author Amy Bloom started out at the kitchen table. However, in such a prime spot, distractions were hard to avoid. "When I walk into the kitchen and see dirty dishes," she says, "I have an impulse to [clean] them." Combined with simultaneously raising two young girls, it's no wonder she had difficulty focusing.

Photograph by William Wright from "Stylish Sheds and Elegant Hideaways"

About six years ago, Bloom finally began designing her dream home office — that is, a writer's shed in the woods near her home in Durham, Conn. To build the 14-by-14 cottage-style structure, Bloom asked a carpenter friend, Roger Bryson, for help. Nearly eight weeks and $15,000 later, Bloom's home office, which sits about 200 feet from the main house, was complete.

The cedar room is austere with just a desk, window seat, bookshelf and a couch. But perhaps most notable about the space is not what it contains but what it lacks. For example, there's a computer but no Internet, no phone and no view from her desk. "It has everything I need, including the absence of what I don't need," she says.

 

 

 

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Write to Diana Ransom at dransom@smartmoney.com.