[Closed] Grand designs

Did he get his glasses from Graceland?

Awesome property. Could've spent £1.5m on a footballer tacky mansion, didn't.

Weird glasses r us - stops them both from seeing reality

I do like some elements of it, but, even if he has a partner, and the four kids living with him it's vast house. With that much glass it'll be a nightmare to heat etc. I think the kitchen was the worst bit, its supposed to be his perfect house but put in three ovens to help sell it. Just seemed like a vanity project that took him to near bankruptcy.

proper OCD that fella, and the rug on the designer was a stunner ! to be fair, I did think that the addition of colour made a big difference

but I thought the overall size was excessive, and although Kevin was getting excited about the trees, the owner didn't really give a sh1t about them other than for their screening so he could build what he wanted... and he had a 360degree aspect to the plot but didn't think about where the sun would rise and fall on the garden/house

and bo11ocks all environmental concern.

Stunning building, fantastic attention to detail.

[i]Watching on Plus 1.
Weaponsgrade funking cuttock.
Just look at him.[/i]

I thought both Clinton and the designer appeared to be nice enough people. I thought they were fairly likable. What's with all the hate?

Got to be honest, I warmed to them and the building over time. I ended up thinking if he's stuck to his budget and spent the other £1m on therapy he would have been better off.

I might have missed a bit at the end, did we get to see the finished white exterior tiles ?

So you chose to watch this instead of the origins of the universe on BBC2?

Nobs 😆

Perhaps because every other week there is a new theory of the Universe?

I think this country probably needs more people like him pushing and fighting for quality rather than accepting the the lower grade crap that we do. A far more beautiful building than your typical housing estate property. A future classic and probably the sort of building that Kevin McCloud was thinking about when devising Grand Design.

Nice car showroom, understand BMW have contacted him fir another couple they have planned... 🙂

I liked his old house, what was wrong with that ?

Has Kevin bought a new jacket yet ?

[i]So you chose to watch this instead of the origins of the universe on BBC2?

Nobs[/i]

Some people have the ability to record live tv, amazing.

[i]I liked his old house, what was wrong with that ? [/i]

Well apart from the blown render the designe was very constrained by planning regs.

so much jealousy in evidence. a wealthy individual with an obsessive attention to detail, would rather see a program like that with a stunning result than the gaudy homes belonging to ‘celebrities’ on through the keyhole. a few Keith Lemon bon-mots from Kev would go down well though. 🙂

I think Grand Designs would greatly benefit from Keith Lemon as presenter. I stopped watching it ages ago, after getting deja vu when hearing the phrase "yes, we've had the windows imported from Germany. They were slightly over-budget at £250,000....."

Its now just an excuse for ludicrously loaded, swaggering, egotistical cockwombles to competitively wave their gold cards about. It ceased to be remotely interesting when it lost contact with most people on planet earth, which was years ago

I thought both Clinton and the designer appeared to be nice enough people. I thought they were fairly likable. What's with all the hate?

They dressed a certain way and had success, money and aspirations. A bit too 'Tory' for STW.

Been trying to think all morning who the designer reminded me of: 😆

[img] [/img]

I thought it was really dull, hardly cutting edge, concrete and glass boxes are nearly a 100 years old. Anyone notice how bad the echo was, which isn't a surprise for a house with so many hard materials.

Poor project management as well, his budget control was dire.

That space could have been used far more creatively.

Poor project management as well, his budget control was dire.

Isn't that just standard for Grand Designs?

Everyone goes hugely over-budget, but it doesn't really matter, as they just nip off and shake the lower branches of the money tree they've got in the back garden?

I presume most of them work for the MOD in procurement 😀

I imagine it will be on the market soon enough.

I thought it was a pretty incredible bit of design, not for me and I have lived in something that looked like his old house..
He's obviously a detail man and there's always the haterz when someone who has some money uses it on what most would consider largesse. Nice house though, i thought the internal colour scheme actually made the place, if it had been white it would have been like a silicon valley office block ! As with all construction projects get your budget and double it then add a contingency - no surprise there really.

I loved that he just borrowed 200k from a friend.

I'm with Klunk I think it will be sold sharp-ish.

[i]They dressed a certain way and had success, money and aspirations. A bit too 'Tory' for STW. [/i]

More like a bit too successful, wealthy and ambitious for many on here it would seem.

I'm glad it wasn't just me & Mrs. Pinkster thinking that. I very rarely really dislike people but Clinton..... with in a few moments it was near terminal notlikeiness.

The acoustics in the rooms once it was finished were chuffin' dreadful as well, I'd hate to live somewhere that echoed like that.

I know plenty of well off people and yet he still came across as trying way too hard; style over substance. TBF a lot of Grand Designs people come over badly, I don't think Kevin's sycophantic smugness helps.

More like a bit too successful, wealthy and ambitious for many on here it would seem.

I don't think its a case of that. Its just that the programme itself has become so formulaic - same type of (very well-off) people, same expensive windows imported from Germany, same angular uninspiring modernist architecture-by-numbers, same half a million quid over-budget - its now just incredibly dull and repetitious.

So you can't relate to the houses they're building, and you don't even want to relate to the people.

Not really a winning formula, is it?

That space could have been used far more creatively.

I disagree.

The space was designed to shout as loudly as possible "LOADDDDSSSSSAAAA MONEYYYYYYYYY". And it did.

I really quite liked it.

But then I like big open flexible spaces rather than what estate agents would call "cosy" and a sane person would call cramped.

With all that concrete would the heating even be that bad? Even in winter it's going to have a lot of solar gain at low angles, and with a presumably well insulated roof it's well shaded in the summer?

So you can't relate to the houses they're building, and you don't even want to relate to the people.

But then "the house that £100k built" - almost entirely red brick redrow/barrrat/trovit/davidwilson dullness with occasional interest.

"Amazing spaces" - more like "hugely compromised, you wouldn't want to live in it for more than a few minutes and often rubbish spaces"

I think one aspect about the house I disliked was the size and scale. I love the Barcelona pavilion, but this was almost a case of "I like that so make it twice as big"

The bits i did like were his office, the pool, the view of the woods from everywhere. I also liked the red panels by the door (although not as gushingly as Kev did)

Clinton and his designer did not come across well. Could be thoroughly decent people but that's not exactly the impression i got from watching last night

This could be interesting: [url= http://www.channel4.com/programmes/take-part/articles/all/my-grand-design-wt ]My Grand Design[/url]

Bit of a Great British Grand-Design Off! I can see some 'interesting' stuff appearing (subject to planning of course). Perhaps Binners could have a go?

Barcelona pavilion was build nearly 80 years ago and was still done better and more interestingly than his house. His was a lazy interpretation IMO.

Perhaps Binners could have a go?

Have you seen the episode of the Simpsons where Homer designs a car........?

[img] [/img]

I actually thought the guy came across as quite nice. Obviously he has a fairly massive OCD problem but nobody's perfect!

House was not my style but I thought it was amazing. He and the designer pulled off what they were trying to achieve perfectly, and the interior was much nicer than I expected it to be in the end.

I agree that these "money no object" builds are getting a bit boring to watch though... so looking forward to the next one.

Not seen the latest one, but agree with binners about the direction the show's gone. The first couple of series were genuinely inspiring, interesting, creative houses. Proof that you didn't need to chuck loadsamoney at something to get a fantastic place to live. Many were renovations and reinterpretations of spaces, rather than vanity projects. But hey ho, Channel 4 obviously know their audience...

Completely agree with packer. I get the money no object thing but the guy built up a successful business from scratch so I have respect for what he's achieved.

The world needs more perfectionists.

One of the many wonders of STW is making a quick lunchbreak read a viable alternative to having to watch the programme in the first place.

Which is handy.

same expensive windows imported from Germany,

To be fair to the show, about 30% of the episodes a series are not mega-bucks money (<£500K)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Grand_Designs_episodes#Series_14_.282014.29

It's just the ridonkulous ones that make the headlines (like that water tower in Kennington a few years ago).

OMITN,

Yes you could probably do a quick sketch of the house and the client from the above info and you'd struggle to get it far wrong.

Here's the key words:

Barcelona pavilion
Massive
OCD
Glasses
Bic (razor)
Woodland
Massive

Thread title should be marked 'spoiler' really.

Completely agree with packer. I get the money no object thing but the guy built up a successful business from scratch so I have respect for what he's achieved.

I don't have a problem with that. Good luck to him. My issue is that to most people the original budgets on the builds they feature are already stratospherically crazy, but then they go quarter, or half a million over-budget and sit talking about if it was a minor problem with the plumbing, after coming up with the extra dosh as if by magic.

The interesting thing about the original programmes was that they featured relatively normal people who had an [i]actual[/i] budget to work too, which meant coming up with compromises or ingenious solutions, which made for interesting telly. Just saying "oh... I'll chuck another half a million at it then", doesn't really count as creative problem solving. Its just the Gordon Brown approach to housebuilding.

And watching it time after time after time on houses that really aren't that architecturally interesting got tedious a long time ago. I've had a look at the house and the clips on the website, and it just looks like countless other houses they've featured over the years.

The interesting stuff with people building houses out of shipping containers, or sustainable materials, or [i]anything[/i] that has a real-world budget seems to have been completely jettisoned, in favour of lazily documenting another millionaires vanity project

Binners +1

Anyone can throw mega money at a concrete box and make it look smart and modern. Even the Romans used concrete more creatively than a lot of grand designs.

What do you mean "Even the Romans", you heathen?!

Do you know what they did for us...

Oh yeah, almost forgot - gotta highlight these two classically OT comments...

What a c0ck master, bet he bic's his head twice a day the chrome dome !

I got the impression his kids don't live with him. I can't imagine why he's single.

🙂

FFS, you should have a word...