DIY Inexpensive Chicken Coop Makeover: Before and After

The story of our farm actually began when we were dating and still lived in Southern California. Andrew’s dad was nice enough to let us build a chicken coop out of pallets in his backyard. Since then, chickens have always been something we’ve enjoyed but we’ve learned along the way that free range chickens and chicken tractors don’t work for us. I actually wrote a post explaining why free range chickens weren’t for us and why a chicken coop works best for our lifestyle. So, we decided to turn our shed into a chicken coop but it really needed a makeover.

Since we decided a chicken coop will always be something that we want on our farm, we wanted to build one the right way. Our shed is actually really nice. It’s 12×12, insulated, and wired for electricity. We had one major problem though, our shed was right behind our master bedroom and that’s the last place you want a chicken coop. You can click here to read some tips to consider when building a chicken coop. Thankfully, one of Andrew’s coworkers came over and helped him move the shed across the property by putting it on logs and moving it with a tractor.

After Andrew moved it, he built a pen for the chickens to roam around in and started to convert the inside with nesting boxes, roosts, etc. The shed works perfectly as a chicken coop but it really needed a coat of fresh paint. One of my good friends came over and we painted it in the middle of a July heat wave but it was totally worth it! We talked the whole time, while her son and Oakley decided to fill the swimming pool with mud ? The life of farm kids!

It took two gallons of white paint and some black paint for the door, skirting, and porch. My friend spotted the already opened and returned gallon of black paint at Lowe’s for only $9! The total for two gallons of white paint and the gallon of black paint was $45. I was so excited to renovate our chicken coop without spending a decent amount of money. We have way too many other farm projects that we want to get done plus there’s no telling what color I’ll want to repaint it in a couple of years ?

The next two pictures are after our first day of painting. It got too hot and humid to continue painting into the afternoon.

Here are the after pictures! Isn’t it crazy what some paint can do to something? I still need to plant some flowers in the pots but I couldn’t wait any longer to share our coop. The chandelier over the door was hung up at our wedding. Stay tuned for a tour of how we set up the inside of our coop!