To get a bit annoyed when Dick and Angel Strawbridge insist they're "normal"

[Frankola]

I love Escape To The Chateau. I love Dick and Angel. I really do.

However, it really annoys me when they frequently insist that they are "every day people" and that "anyone can do it".

They ARE NOT every day people! Dick is a respected engineering and environmental expert who has appeared on tele for years before ETC. He's done Scrap Heap Challenge, Coast and all sorts!

Angel is actually a qualified chartered accountant with a professional background in business studies. She was a successful businesswoman in London, creating The Vintage Patisserie hospitality business and also appeared on Dragons Den - where she secured funding for her latest investment.

They were introduced by their agent. Does that sound "normal" to you?

Do every day couples pitch their search for a new life to production companies? Channel 4 even funded their house searching France for them to find the Chateau as they approached them from the very beginning of their project to maximise the potential they saw in this.

Don't get me wrong. I'm all for their success. But I find it a bit insulting almost to expect the doting British public to just buy that these people could be any Tom, Dick or Harry (pun intended).

Any one else feel like this?

I wonder what Dick's next project will be?

jolie why are you so concerned by dicks ex wife?

I dont understand those intimating that money seems to be conjured up from nowhere for things like a new heating system? On one of the episodes it mentioned Dick going back to the U.K. to do some filming. I think he’s probably been involved involved with stuff we’re not aware of that has brought in some money which has enabled them to do the chateau up bit by bit. And to gradually increase their offering as a venue. They started off fairly basic in what they offered to paying guests and have expanded and improved as the money from that and then tV show has come in. You can’t do it all at once.

I love them and the kids are adorable.
Angel looks amazing.
Of course they’re not ordinary. Who does DIY, however simple, and not end up swearing, ever?!

So he had a wife before Angel I don’t see the issue tbh

DD and I are just intrigued as to what Angel and Kirstie send each other for Christmas. We imagine a bit of a passive aggressive completion going on with regard to homemade Christmas gifts.
Wonder if the two are acquainted and what an evening would be like with both of them.
Would love to see a homemade Christmas with Kirstie and Angel TV special. Imagine the competition

I love the fact his name is Strawbridge and he’s an engineer. Conjures up all sorts of wacky imaginings in my head about his family history. Does he have a great great great great great grandfather whose bridges all fell down and he was given the nicknames Strawbridge as an insult?

Or was he so good that he could even make the sturdiest bridges out of straw?

I need to get a life.....

Would love to see a homemade Christmas with Kirstie and Angel TV special. Imagine the competition grin

Yes! Genius!

Dick is a Dick and always will be ... I do find him entertaining on a Sunday evening.

Why is he?

@CurlyhairedAssassin

I think he has a couple of elderly sisters.

The last thread about Dick

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/2660166-to-feel-sympathy-for-the-first-mrs-straw-ridge?pg=10

Doesnt explain why hes a dick or why shes a poor woman?

OH watches it, I can’t stand the programme. I wouldn’t see them as everyday people at all.

She's 41, but still looks incredible her skin is amazing

How can you tell under all that makeup?

minty shes been filmed loads with no makeup on hasnt she?

minty shes been filmed loads with no makeup on hasnt she?

Aye. Sure she has.

She does have great skin. I’m in awe of their stamina.

Pmk

She definitely has lol.

Bollykecks, why do you think some posters are so doubtful about this stuff? I don’t get it, so you?

She has been filmed many times very clearly with no make up on at all (including no eyebrows). Digital HD telly and daylight don’t hide anything. Yes her whole look does then look quite ordinary but she does have amazing looking bare skin.

No i dont get it!

They explain everything money wise if you watch it and yes you can tell when shes no makeup on though yes i agree she has lovely skin.

"If you live a more sheltered life with a narrower range of friends and aquaintances then yeah they are a bit exotic I guess!"

How patronising. It's not sheltered to not be friends with millionaires and TV celebs. And those people are not 'normal people'.

She has been filmed many times very clearly with no make up on at all (including no eyebrows). Digital HD telly and daylight don’t hide anything.
And magazines don’t airbrush at all either.

Seriously, you fall for that shit?

JolieOBrien that thread says nothing either/ he married once got divorced and remarried....Am I missing the bit where I need clutch my pearls?

What nasty people Jolie and Housinghelp seem. Posting horrid things about people who have done them no harm. In Jolies case tied up in faux concern for the children.