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I've watched that show.
What irks me the most is the fact that people seems to think that ignoring the advice of architects is a great idea. They go and look at similar spaces, agree that this is the best course of action and then promptly go home, change the plans and dismiss the concepts of someone with significantly better vision.
Obviously there are always budget constraints, but a lot of what the architects say makes sense.
Over the years I've seen so many badly converted properties where budgets were obviously at the forefront of the minds of the developers/landlords. Flats sold/marketed as two bedroom properties where the second bedroom is no bigger than a phonebox etc is all as a result of not employing the right people to do the best possible job.
I get that a lot of the ideas and concepts might be seen as fads, but I don't understand cheap fixes. I've always made a point of spending bigger on the aspects of the build that I couldn't do myself, and then taking time to get the fixtures and fittings that I really want as opposed to cheap fixes. To all the people who'd rather spend £2k on UPVC window units than £15k on some bespoke glazing stuff: you'll never see that money again. In London it's well known that in most cases, for every £100 spent it can be worth up to ten times as much when you come to sell it on.
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I personally am offended by downstairs rooms....
... But how do you hide a discrete bathroom?!?!?!
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A lot of this is true. The thing that annoyed me was the geezer who got all the parquet flooring for free.
BUT there are a lot of good tips on there, the couple with the flat where they installed a big opening in the kitchen and a new bathroom - their flar was massively improved.
The issue seems to come when people stray from what the architect is telling them because despite the red leather satchels, pleather full length dresses, soul patches and 16 handmade jem stone necklaces from Spitalfields market - they do generally know what they're talking about.The place with the big window, where they knocked through the ceiling, I thought that architect was a right flannel but it turned out really great and the idea of just painting everything one colour did really work
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@Dooks-Fatberg
As we're about to embark on a project I've been suffering a fair bit of property-porn TV. There's a series on the beeb at the mo called The £100k House - Tricks of the Trade which, on the face of it should be quite helpful as it's generally about projects of the size and type we're considering. I've watched 5 and a half eps now and every one of the is exactly the same:
A terribly dressed architect (soul patch, boot-cut jeans, collarless leather jacket, backpack, pony tail etc) convinces some hapless prole with a shoe-string budget to remove all the walls and half the ceilings from their ground floor, install giant glass bi-fold doors ("to connect the space with garden") they then finish it off with industrial concrete, one bare brick wall, a wood burner and furniture built out of scaffold boards surrounded by 6 Eames knock offs and a giant danish ceiling lamp ("as a focal point"). Furnish with Ikea rugs, half-a dozen colour-co-ordinated books and a bowl of ALL THE SAME FRUIT and voila.
What have architects got against downstairs rooms anyway? Don't get me wrong i'm not against the concept per se, it's just the certainty with which these cretins insist that this latest design fad is the logical result of thousands of years of technological and aesthetic progress. As if no-one ever thought of it before and now that they have, all our problems will be over.
You'd think TV would have learned since Changing Rooms in the 90s where every house got it's beautiful original features ripped out or boxed in with stenciled MDF. The lack of foresight is staggering.
*le sigh