by I just read an essay in the Times titled Who Doesn’t Love to Hate-Watch HGTV? First, it’s not hate-watch for me, I love it all. But I did agree that so often the homes are being turned into the same place over and over and over. I wish there was more variety in the final product. But it doesn’t make me hate these shows, I still love them and I’m still entertained.
The essay did make me fantasize though, and this is a big part of the allure of these shows, fantasizing, but my fantasy was: there’s a contest and I can pick a home (paid for by the network) and then pick one of these show hosts to renovate it. There are certain things that each of them does that I love, and the best would be a combination of their talents, but in my fantasy I went with Brett Waterman from Restored. Those are my tastes, I love history and original details. But I love the Good Bones girls and what they do (and they have excellent taste in paintings), and I considered them, and I love how the Home Town people make things out of what they tore out of the house, and Jonathan on Property Brothers when he’s designing for one of those Brother vs Brother contests, I could go on. Oh and I want both Love it or List it and Love it or List it, Too to return!
Also part of my fantasy is buying my own furniture, and artwork, and having a say about all the finishes if there’s something that can’t be restored. I don’t understand people who hand all of this over to the show hosts and then move into a home they didn’t lovingly furnish themselves. Even if some of my tastes are just plain bad, I want my home to be reflection of me, bad taste and all. Otherwise I’d feel like I was moving into someone else’s home.
Which reminds me, my yearly Spring Cleaning is coming up. I can’t afford all the professional cleaning I had done in the year pictured below, but oh well! What I need more than professional cleaning is to have all of my wooden windows restored. They are completely falling apart. Brett Waterman can’t help me alas, because I rent. They’re likely never going to be fixed by anyone!
Your HGTV comments made me think…a rare occurence! I agree that a home should reflect the tastes and lifesyle of the resident and not some team of “professionals” that interpret your style for you. And many of the results look the same as the previous ones. No real creativity. Our kids arent learning to be creative in schools either. The world seems to be stuck in a BigBrother knows best mode. We are constantly inundated with the proper way to do this or that by these people who we don’t really know. Similarly, the Facebook scandal that let people’s personal data be used by crooks.
So I think your room is lovely and cozy. I don’t know how you keep that comforter clean with 3 cats. I can’t fit my comforter in the washing machine. 🙂
I have to go to a laundry and they have big, commercial machines!
Thank you for the compliment about my living room!!
I haven’t been watched as much HGTV as I used to. But remember This Old House on PBS! Loved it.
As for your windows, I am stunned that the landlord/owner of the building won’t replace them? Surely they are the building owner’s responsibility. What if each tenant replaced the windows with whatever they liked, wouldn’t that be a mess.
It’s a long story.
And I remember This Old House. I loved that show. I watched it when it was Bob Villa.