home sweet home

I agree, they must have rich friends or relatives who agree to interest free loans. Either that or they've sold a kidney !
I do enjoy watching all these types of programmes though.

The one that gets me is the one with George Clark brings in an architect who prices it all up to their budget and never comes in anywhere near the budget. How do these people justify what they do? The home owner always ends up over £50k over budget and sometimes £150k over. Ugly house to Lovely house. Ok some of that is their choice of finishes etc but a lot is just the work specified.

Grand Designs - it all goes wrong, it will never get finished and is always way over budget!
Do they have an army of cleaners in before they go back to see the finished house, everywhere shiny, no smeary windows or clutter anywhere!

The programmes where they knock the whole of the ground floor into one big living/dining/kitchen/study/play room ! How do they keep it heated in this country and how on earth do you keep it all tidy?

And, of course, escaping to the country is fine if you have £850,000 to play with.

Yes, I know what you mean, just pop to the bank to borrow another £150.00, no problem! They go through all these horrendous disasters, it rains continuously for months on end, everything they’ve budgeted for costs ten times more, then lo and behold! An amazing, spotless, enormous, mainly glass eco friendly designer home!

Another strange thing, they’ve always had a baby by the end of it all, must be cosy in that caravan with nothing much to do!!

petunia all I find down the back of my sofa are ballpoint pens and biscuit crumbs

And they all buy a houseful of new furniture !! What with ?

I recently saw Kevin say that he wouldn't want to live in any of the houses he's had on Grand Designs! He thought a lot of them have ideas that turn out to be far too big.

On the other hand I'd love to have a little corner in Dick Strawbridge's chateau!

I wonder if, when the house is nearing completion, the (potential) value has increased enough for them to be able to borrow more.

But if so they do seem to have generous incomes.

Deedaa I think Kevin has an old farmhouse in RL.

He came to a village near us a while ago and we called at that house when we got lost - I wanted to ask the householder if we could come in to have a look around but didn't have the nerve!

We've given up on Grand Designs, there is a limit to how many big white boxes with white walls and nowhere comfortable or cosy to sit that one can watch.

We have even given up on George Clark, we watched the first program of his new series where the owners where co-erced into a house that didn't do what they asked for at £150,000 over budget and was both dull and ugly when finished.

There are several such houses in our village, thankfully all on hidden plots. One looks like a cross between a Dutch barn and an industrial unit. I have yet to meet anyone that likes them. The barn lookalike manages to be both dull and gross at the same time.

The Grand Designs house near us is wooden (I think) and can't be seen at all as it's in woodland.

However, many of the houses have acres of glass and I wonder why these people would be happy displaying their lives to anyone who may just wander past.

These home/start a new life in the sun programmes have become so formulaic.

They must think the viewer is stupid.

To create tension they have impossible deadlines, things going wrong, things breaking, delays, and budgeting worries. They are all on the verge of going under (eye roll) when they manage to bankroll the next part of the venture with ease.

Not only that, the programmes are designed to be sold, so have frequent advertisement breaks and immediately afterwards we are given a five minute recap of what went before!! OH and I have said we have wasted at least half an hour of our lives per programme because so much of it is repeated!

They have lost their interest.

Not only that, has anyone else noticed how traditional suburban houses have been given the grey window frames/ big glass windows/ grey rendered outsides/stark plain driveways makeover - with, most likely - small standard bay trees in tubs either side of the front door?

It is a look that is becoming as common as muck/footballers' wives-ish and stands out like a sore thumb in nice leafy roads and will be so old hat/dated in a few years time. People can be so sheep-like, can't they?

There's was one Grand Designs house I really loved - I think K McC did too - it was built in woodland, entirely of immediately local materials, i.e. largely wood, by a man who if IIRC was a woodsman, or whatever they're called.
It was beautifully warm and cosy-looking.

As for those vast, white boxes, though, with acres of glass and never any curtains of blinds to shut out the dark, I can't bear them. It's noticeable how final filming is always on a lovely sunny day, never a wet, grey miserable one, let alone on a dark winter's night.

And what is it with this sort of house where it's all 'climate controlled/ventilated' - so that in all those acres of glass there isn't one window you can actually open?

Witzend I loved that one. In the early series of GD they had a number of really interesting projects: conversions, renovations that were virtually rebuilds and some on really small tight budgets or being built to meet very particular philosophical or physical needs of the builder.

I can always remember one older couple, where he was one of life's awkward b******ds and want to demolish his nice Georgian style house on a modern expensive estate to build an ultra modern home despite the objections of neighbours.

Well he got his way and I always remember the final scenes, they stood in this modern open plan glass building with modern furniture both looking as miserable as sin and the door to the 'snug' was just open enough to see that it contained the carpets, curtains, 3 piece suite and wall units from their previous house - and that is where they spent most of their time in the new house.

I think nowadays the only people interested in being featured on these programs are architects with one eye on the publicity value of seeing their masterpieces(????) and names on tv.

Do you remember the one where new buyers of a tiny end terrace mews house in a very narrow street were extending and remodelling? I think they were digging down into the basement/foundations to extend underground, and huge lorries with supplies and machinery were blocking the street, reversing, revving up etc, for weeks on end. It all had to be propped up, excavated from a tiny space, and looked a complete eyesore when it was finished. Underground they built a dance floor/disco, complete with mirrors and lights. (If I remember correctly.)

Not only did they seem to have more money than sense but they knocked out so many of the period features with their trendy new look. It was ghastly!

I wonder if the neighbours ever spoke to them after that lengthy disruption?

I remember that one, it was actually a new house built at the end of a mews of terraced houses in West London. They were building the house on a tiny site, right up against a railway embankment not a main line, but a very busy urban route, possible above ground tube, and their definition of a living room was a long narrow room with a huge screen on one long wall and a long orange sofa almost as long as the room facing it. That was it, no other furniture, nothing except a screen and seating, like a cinema.

Oh, and it had an underlit dance floor for Mrs.

They were both so aching trendy they met themselves coming back

I agree with all of the above but still enjoy watching. There has been a new programme on recently called 'Your Home Made Perfect' where 2 different architects submit plans for improvements and demonstrate them in virtual reality - really clever. However, the Irishman comes up with the most whacky ideas. Last week's had a huge open living space with no proper bedrooms, just beds in open pods. Nowhere for wardrobes and bed accessed on hands and knees. How on earth would they change the sheets as there was no space around the edge? The other, more sensible, idea was chosen this time, but of course it went way over budget as ever.

They were building the house on a tiny site, right up against a railway embankment not a main line, but a very busy urban route, possible above ground tube

That's the one M0nica

Location, location, location it was not!

I remember thinking their living area was stark and most unwelcoming.

However, the Irishman comes up with the most whacky ideas

Oh he wasn't related to Diarmuid Gavin, the genial Irish garden designer was he shysal? He goes for concrete balls, tunnels covered in turf, wigwam type summer houses and plenty of heavy galvanised steel linked chains to edge seating areas! Gavin is to gardens what Laurence Llewellyn-Bowen was to room make-overs.

Sounds like it might be an interesting programme.

In “Your home made perfect”, Shysal, has the Irishman (is it Robert?) won at all? I’ve only seen a couple of episodes, but the female architect’s designs won. The presenter seems like she’s on a dating show - very flirty!! The virtual reality aspect is amazing.

I love Location LIOLI and Place in the Country. What annoys me is when someone views a house worth something like £800k which I could absolutely never afford unless I win the lottery, and say that there would be too many things needing changed or the half acre garden is too small.. There are people homeless for goodness sake!

I saw that one, shysal and was so relieved they didn't opt for his plan. Those silly pods for "bedrooms" with no space, no windows. Almost like sleeping in a coffin! It really was an horrendous design in my humble opinion. However, even though the people opted for the other architect, they still changed it and went considerably over their budget. Where do they find this extra money so readily?!

Although we don't see all the same shows here in Canada (although I have seen a few of those mentioned above) I do see where the shows get so formulaic after a while.

Oh no, bad news... we found some rot under the windows... the whole wall will have to come down etc. Now you will have to choose different cabinets for your kitchen.

I always enjoy the first season of a new show, then move on!