As the standard altazimut platform isn't very well suited for photography (by quickly introducing field rotation), I started thinking about buying an equatorial one. Prices of the Meade eqatorial wedge as well as most commercial alteratives being rather high, I constructed my own version that despite being entirely made of wood seems to be rather sturdy. Mounted on four wheels, it could be rolled out of my garage onto an observing platform in the garden.
Although this cut the setup time in two, I still wanted a quicker solution, sidestepping finetuning of the polar orientation and mounting of cameras and all the other stuff. A permanent observatory seemed the only solution. Because of budget limitations, it had to be a roll-off roof DIY construction, the base being laid around the existing observing platform.
Fitting rather tightly around the telescope, it is a box about 2mx2mx1,7m with the roof adding at most 0,25m to the height. For more comfortable observing, a separate 2mx1m 'control room' was added. It houses some accessories and a desk for the computer (connecting to the control and data cables).

A sliding door gives acces to this room, a plastic window allowing visual contact with the telescope. The roof rolls off on six wheels along (for the moment) wooden rails and is laterally retained by four small wheels pushing against two wooden planks.
With the telescope now permanently mounted, I unearthed my 35 year old 6cm refractor, fitted it to the Meade by means of some plumbers hardware, and got me a Meade DSI to be used as an autoguider. For imaging planetary nebulae at f/10, the 900mm focal lenght is somewhat short of ideal and exposure times are still limited. For deep sky photography of more extended objects at approximately f/6, it seems to perform sufficiently well (although finding a brigh enough guide star isn't always easy).