What is wrong with people who go on Grand Designs?

[RobynRB]

Seriously, time and time again it's the same thing. Why do people feel they need to build a house the size of a cinema complex and then moan when they run out money. Most of these things could be 10-20% smaller and you wouldn't even notice. Don't these people understand that materials like wood and concrete cost money so buy less of them and the house will be cheaper.

Speaking of which, last night was a classic case... we haven't got any money, but we bought this copper bath for our bedroom and this (frankly disgusting but I'm guessing ridiculously expensive) gold and black marble for our kitchen.

It struck me the reservoir building was big enough to build a reasonable house in, maybe with a smaller extension to the side. It certainly looked twice the size of my three bedroomed house on it's own.

And of course five minutes after they started they announced they were having a child. What brilliant timing...

because of this thread I rewatched the Pru one, the art deco clifftop lighthouse one and the latest one.

I still cannot fathom how this week's couple made the money. I looked at salaries for a sky diving instructor and an audiologist and - even with online sweet selling - they don't get you a half million mortgage, let alone the ridiculous sums mentioned at the end. And their insta shows multiple holidays to expensive locations during when they were supposedly broke... it just seems exceptionally weird. Maybe there was more than one non-grandad.

One that I watched today was a recap of the couple in Herefordshire who made their wooden home v e r y slowly over something like 12 years. I really enjoyed it and the fact that everything was recycled and painstakingly made. He bent hundreds of wooden tiles for the roof by hand and waited three years to find the right bent tree to make his huge arched window frame. Not my taste but the house was pretty impressive, they seemed to be really happy and their children were also happy (and very creative) too. I like those ones more than the "here's a big fuck off art gallery with acres of glass and we managed to find an extra million down the back of the sofa" episodes.

Years ago I used to work for a company that sold a particularly uninteresting piece of kit that goes into fancy new build houses, think along the lines of laundry chutes (it wasn’t laundry chutes) but we were pretty much the only firm that sold them because the market for them was pretty small. Anyway at least once a month we’d get a request for a discount because they were going on Grand Designs or the one on channel 5 and we’d always very politely say no because they won’t feature out boring product so you can pay like everyone else.

The only obnoxious demand for a discount was the one they built in a bunker and our engineers looked at it and said not only will we not give you a discount but we won’t supply you either because the logistics of putting it in a bunker would be a nightmare and it wouldn’t work properly. I must say I was very pleased to see when they were featured that they had got as far as a concrete shell and run out of money, it looked like a multi storey car park.

@Buggersticks
I've already listed my reasons for not wanting a house made almost entirely of glass even if it is bespoke from germany/Italy and weighs 3 tons but I hadn't thought about the rain being noisy. I absolutely hate the sound of the rain on the windows/conservatory roof - I'll add that to my list!
(Not that I have any yearning - or the budget - to build a grand designs scale house)

Ben the woodsman is a real feel good episode. But he knew what he was doing and planned realistically. And two babies in the end, I think.

I also liked the young Welsh couple rebuilding a ruined cottage during the foot and mouth outbteak. They weren't over ambitious or pretentious, just ordinary people who wanted to live where they had grown up. It was in a National Park, so they couldn't build new, and were very limited in what materials they were allowed to use.

one I remember for the wrong reasons is a couple who gutted a perfectly nice early Victorian house in London. They put in a glass box loo. The wife was going to have a flat roof on the extension, and she was going to get in German workers to do it, because they were much better than British workers.

Of course it leaked, and the British workmen were absolutely not smirking....

then she had a go at the electrician when he said he couldn't work while there was rain running down the walls inside the building.

I'm glad I'm not the only person who wouldn't want to live in those glass and steel or polished concrete boxes! I wondered if I was missing something and must be some kind of architectural philistine who didn't understand "great" architecture.

@DavesSpareDeckChair , I like the idea but wouldn't want to live in one.

I always wonder how they keep all the massive glass windows clean and finger mark free
Would drive me bonkers!!
We like the more modest ones where they do the work themselves
One of the early water tower ones is up the road from us

We wait now for the pregnancy announcements if they are that age group. I also hate the paired back look with all the cables and pipework on display and polished cement floors and worktops. 😝 but the thing that is the most annoying is Kevin waxing lyrical about it when he does his bit to camera at the end, even though all the way through he has given the impression he doesn't like it.

Love this thread. I'm in the middle of a very small version of grand designs and I'm fed up. Everything is taking longer than the builder said. When talking to people I say ' I don't know why I expected it to be done on time, I watch grand designs, I know how this works' 🙈😂

I’ve always wondered what happened to the guy who couldn’t get the roof to stop leaking. Made it in ply and sloping into itself. A normal roof just couldn’t do.

I love it when they’ve run out of money, borrow money from banks, friends and family, then spend thousands on brand new furniture they didn’t actually NEED. Like why not just use your original furniture and buy the stuff when you can afford it?

Windows so large that they can never have curtains.

I don't think that's how it happens 🤔

The Huf Haus! It came with its own set of German builders to put it all together. I remember Kevin being very impressed with their hyper-organised toolboxes 😂

Oh yes, and when they left, the engineers even swept the floor of their van!

I actually know two people who have been on GD... both were tricky builds but actually successful.

I also know someone who was turned down, as there wasn't likely to be enough potential in their build for disaster!

@FaeWings I couldn't agree more! It is wasted on them!

That sounds like the perfect home, so I don't think the producers will ever be contacting you I'm afraid.

Everyone associated with that show should be rounded up, put on an Atol somewhere with a tool box and left to it. And no, it shouldn't be filmed.
Selling delusion as aspiration/inspiration is a despicable thing. And that twat that presents it? Lock him up. Preferably in a crumbling, poorly designed prod

No Kevin McLoud would never do that! 😁
He exudes fertility he’s not a serial shagger.

Was this the one the size of an aircraft hangar with just a middle aged couple living there? I loved the concept but the house was not a home

Off topic. We are watching this program for many years and we find it entertaining. But. What is it with Kevin sticking his tongue out and licking his lips in every single episode??😅 Like he is talking his usual business, it’s all good, and then, all of a sudden his tongue comes out, polishes the entire mouth and quickly goes back😳has any one noticed? Or is it just me😆

Might just be me , but l spend the whole program thinking “ how many cleaners / window cleaners etc will they need “ and “how are they going to heat that ! “ …love it though 😆

Is likelihood of disaster a criteria? I've often wondered what they count as disaster as the majority of houses do complete but which vastly more money spent on them.

The Art Deco cliff house (I'd forgotten the lighthouse aspiration) was probably the biggest overall disaster in terms of family, money and ridiculous from the outset but most do finish and at least present an image to camera of fixed smiles.

DH and I were talking about architects not actually asking people how they live and just coming up with a design that looks good. Tiny bedrooms and massive social spaces when you have children who will spend huge amount of time in bedrooms! How many of these properties are not future proof at all, no allowances for changes in family numbers and things.
I can’t imagine spending all this time and money and in the end you end up with a property that isn’t comfortable and becomes less so with age.

Well, great... now next week I am going to spend the whole episode waiting for that.