Season 1 · Episode 1
Architect Chris Moller meets Southland farmer Lachlan McDonald, who's building a modernist concrete home with a controversial roof in one of the most remote parts of NZ.
Chris meets Gus and Sarah whose solution to spiraling house prices is to make their first home an Earthship - an off-the-grid house made of recycled rubbish, earthen bricks and clay. An Earthship is a non-traditional home built using recycled materials such as bottles and tyres, and even mussel shells for insulation. Young Coromandel couple Gus and Sarah Anning decided to step outside the norm with their Grand Design when they realized they couldn't afford a traditional home. Enlisting the help of community volunteers, both here and overseas and using unique building techniques originally designed for the desert in California, it's not certain how this Grand Design will fare in Coromandel's temperamental climate.
Chris meets Scottish migrant and urbanite, Scott Lawrie, who has a dream for a new life and a radical new stainless steel home in the remote hills behind Pakiri. Sydney-based writer Scott Lawrie's plans for his new life in New Zealand are encapsulated in a sculptural steel house he is building on a remote rural hillside behind Pakiri beach. Scott has an unrelenting refusal to compromise on his "legacy", but a budget can only be stretched so far. Will Scott realize his extraordinary dream?
Chris meets builder Steve Sygrove, who's planning to build and ornate and colourful American Gothic home in the Titirangi bush. Fifth generation builder Steve Sygrove and his wife, Chrissy, have a passion for things pretty, floral and pink. Their unique build in the Titirangi bush near Auckland is a handcrafted American Gothic style house complete with ornate detailing like a Juliette balcony, spandrels, a horseshow window, lacework valences, and interior walls made of fabric. Steve rallies against the bureaucracy that is stifling the creativity in his craft and expects this grand dame of a building will be his swansong.
Chris meets architect Nic Ballara, who's planning to build a house on a steep 45-degree slope overlooking Wellington. Nic Ballara clearly has a head for heights as he starts to build a family home for him and his wife Callie and their 12-year-old daughter. Nic's site in the earthquake prone city of Wellington is so steep that it looks virtually impossible to build on, however Nic is convinced he has a solution and is determined to build his first home there. A logistical nightmare lies ahead as this Grand Design looks to be an uphill battle throughout.
Chris meets Hamish and Diane Divett, who are rebuilding their house on the most unlikely spot - on the edge of a crumbling cliff top that plummets 40 metres to the sea below. Surfing Pastor Hamish Divett and his psychologist wife Diane have lived by the ocean for years, but in a dark, south-facing house that failed to take full advantage of the beautiful vista. To get the view they desperately desire, the couple have decided to push structural and logical planning to the limits. By building on a crumbling cliff with a sheer drop to the sea below, the Divetts will push their team to the edge to see this Grand Design though to completion.
After years of living apart with their separate children, Mike and Catherine are finally building an extraordinary straw bale together on top of a rocky outcrop in central Otego. Between them, Mike and Cathy have seven children from their previous marriages. With the last child finally moved out of home, the couple are going to build a Grand Design in which they will live alone together for the first time. They will be calling on Catherine's skills as one of the few female joiners in the country and Mike's talents as an inventor to build a unique straw bale and hemp house on an exposed rocky outcrop near Wanaka.
The series finale sees Marty import two old American barns from New York valley, which are raised by heritage builders and merged with a design for a modern home. Timber merchant Marty Verry and his Venezuelan wife Morella have imported two historic New York barn frames that could be considered the oldest buildings in New Zealand. With plans to assemble the barn on the couples' rural site on the outskirts of Auckland, they intend them to become part of a modernist mansion acting as a tribute to the different timber Marty loves. But will the new homes honour the history they are built on or is this Grand Design set to take on a life of its own?
Make My House Bigger follows bold homeowners with ambitious plans to gain an extra room or two. Packed full of take-home advice about these ever more popular projects, each episode looks at the conversion of either a loft or a cellar.
2012
Renovating the homes of deserving families while having candid conversations about parenthood.
2023
An ambitious group of eight amateur home remodelers team up to renovate an amazing old house one room at a time. For the next eight weeks, these creative competitors will live in and work together on the house, one room at a time. Each week, they'll compete and collaborate on a different room. When it's all over, one of them will win the keys to the house!
2004
Property renovator Simon O'Brien charts the stories of brave homeowners who are risking everything to breathe new life into some of the country's most dilapidated properties. Run down, boarded up and falling to bits, most people who run a mile from these houses. But, in My Dream Derelict Home, fifteen brave couples are putting everything on the line to save them.
2014
British version of the reality competitions series that sees young entrepreneurs compete in several business tasks, attempting to survive the weekly firings in order to become the business partner of one of the most successful businessmen.
2005
TV's original home-improvement show, following one whole-house renovation over several episodes.
1979
Home renovation experts Keith Bynum and Evan Thomas fulfill their dream of restoring Motor City's iconic American neighborhoods one house at a time in the new series.
2021
Featuring renovation expert Carter Oosterhouse who leads three teams as they battle it out to transform dilapidated homes in Cincinnati, Ohio. Taking on the rundown houses in a distressed neighborhood, the teams will renovate one home each – while also living together – in a bid to raise the property value of the community surrounding them. The team that increases the appeal of their home to the max goes home with the grand prize of $50,000 and their home renovation will be featured on Dwell magazine’s website. Designer, Kathy Kuo, and Cincinnati-based house flipper, Jim Bronzie, judge the team’s renovations.
Real-life cousins Anthony Carrino and John Colaneri seek out deserving neighborhood heroes then surprise them with amazing home makeovers.
2013
Renovation, design and real estate pros Chip and Joanna Gaines are paired with Waco/Dallas, Texas-area buyers to renovate the wrong house that's in the right location.
Headliners by night and expert tradesman by day, Ben Cleary, Dan Paterson, Liam Black and Malik Wills-Martin will work with celebrated interior designer Kelly Stone to turn their clients' humdrum homes into glitzy desert oases.
Daryl Hall certainly has a passion for music, having produced hit after hit as the co-founder and lead vocalist of the pop-rock group Hall & Oates. His creative side doesn't end there; however, for years Hall has stoked his love of vintage architecture by buying historic homes and restoring them to their original style. Rocker turned-renovator Daryl Hall is putting down his guitar and picking up a hammer on his mission to restore a quaint 18th century home in Sherman, CT. According to local legend, the house was owned by a widowed sea captain and hasn't been touched in decades. Combining Daryl's love of history and vintage architecture, he and his team of craftsman will have this one-bedroom cottage singing with 1780s charm by the time they’re finished.
From the steps of the courthouse to the "oohs" and "aahs" of an open house, five teams of expert flippers bid against each other for abandoned houses sight unseen. It's a high-stakes hour in which three auctions are won, three houses are renovated and then all three houses go on the market for top dollar. Which team took the biggest risk, worked the hardest and overcame the biggest challenges? Find out on Flip It to Win It.
New visions for homes are revealed by virtual reality, but which will be built in reality?
2019
Who do you turn to when a home renovation job goes horribly awry? Spike’s original docu-reality series, “Catch a Contractor,” aims to turn the table on contractors who have done their clients wrong. Host Adam Carolla helps homeowners regain their dignity and their humble abodes from the clutches of crooked contractors.
No description available.
2024
