I really do not think the children are very involved. The shows I've seen have the children drop by at the staging process and mom hands a flower to a kid to put in a vase. And the kids, especially the daughter, look very scruffy---that child's hair needs brushing. Don't care for Joanna's decorating style and neither host is particularly well spoken. That's not unusual on HGTV but agree that their most common utterance is "you guys."

madeyna , when you "stage" a house it is exactly that, a stage to show you potential.. it would not be economical to have "new" furnture in every house.. therefore same furniture in numerous episodes.. the same style is because it's the same person doing it..

Well you see a lot of the same designers do different homes and they do not look all the same. IMO a good designer takes into account the client's taste. However if this is just "staging" then sure that is another matter. I did like the recent mid-century design she did, it forced her to do something different. Which she showed she can do. I am sure the homeowners can come in and add some color if they want. Personally I like a lot of color.

I am tired of the show already and I really liked it at first but the lack of creativity from house to house bores me now. I gave it over 10 episodes to try and win me back but they have failed. I do agree they seem like a nice family, though.

It's funny, this is the only show where the more I watch I find myself looking forward to the touring of the potential homes than I do the finished product because it never seems to vary,

The old houses are more interesting.

I just watched the last Fixer Upper where Jojo had to decorate in MODERN! She did pretty well. It was interesting to see her choices. Chip couldn't understand black AND WHITE KITCHEN CABINETS. Others have done better in this style, like Candace Olson, but it was a good try.

I was impressed by the kitchen in the modern house. I loved the glass shelves sitting in between the gold cab to ceiling poles (maybe plumbing parts). I thought that was pretty genius of her. The price of the house including the rehab was so low!

AKtillery, thanks for posting the picture! This I appreciate for she did indeed break out of her comfort zone. I guess I will try watching again.

She definitely broke out! Wish there were more episodes like this one!

Like Fixer Upper and Property Brothers. Tonight Joanna did something a bit different, but the Home Goods shopping trip was really bad. Who shops there? T

he best ever was Candace. And surprised no one mentioned how HORRIBLE Fix or Flop is.... oh dear. Talk about annoying,

I love Home Goods! Have you ever been? But yeah, it was clearly an ad for them... and seemed rehearsed. Still I am glad for them, looks like they are getting a lot of attention.

I also love Candace, where has she been? They need some more shows with great designers! I do like the show Rehab Addict, her commitment to preservation and her community is fantastic.

I like Fip or Flop for many of the reasons people like Fixer Upper, hubby Tarek and wife Christina are nice and respect one another. They make a good team.

I love the show Fixer Upper!! I DVR each show, and watch more than once. I'm a nut about all things Real Estate.

Isn't it funny that so many of us, which in my minds translates to so many HGTV viewers as a whole, seem to like best the shows where the hosts are nice and respectful? Now why can't the HGTV brass take that and run with it?!? Get rid of the snarky east coast "Love It or List It" and some of the other boring "buy a house, sell a house shows" (although NOT Property Brothers, which I love), hire some more great designers . . . and insist that homeowners/home buyers put on their big kid panties and stop acting like a bunch of petty, whiney, spoiled brats if they want to be on one of the shows. Ha ha, that will never happen, which is why I watch so few HGTV shows these days. I miss Candace and so many other former nice, talented, fun hosts.

That's one reason I like Fixer Upper, which is really the only HGTV show I watch now. Chip and Joanna are funny, and I don't think Chip's lines are scripted. One of the funniest things he said when Joanna was putting some "antique" or shabby chic kinds of items on the wall, is "what other stuff did you find in the trash that we need to put on the wall?"

I am not a huge fan of Fixer Upper. I feel like she has a bag of ten tricks like so many decorators I've met in real life. Some of her work is nice, but all the remodels look too similar to keep my interest. I really enjoyed the Sarah Richardson and Candice Olsen shows and wish HGTV would return to those. I also used to enjoy those Decorators and Landscapers Challenge shows back in the day to see how three different professionals approached one space.

Speaking of nice hosts, remember the lady that did "trash to treasure" and a show where they redid a room for under $500. She had short hair and also did one the first dream house giveaway tours? I think maybe her first name was Joan? I really liked her! I too hate snarky dumb stuff...

I do think this couple or mostly genuine and Chip is very funny... it keeps me tuning in more so than the make overs.

I really loved the Sarah house projects, where she would redo an entire house over one season... You really got to see the entire process and something from start to finish. I know she did at least one more for Canadian TV that has not yet aired in the U.S.

Here is a random question, did anyone ever watch the show "Stagers" where they staged a house to put it on the market? I swear that Kerry Washington (Scandal) worked as an assistant to one of the stagers before she hit it big? I even remember her telling him she had to leave cause she had an audition!

The budgets and actual cost seem unrealist.

A great show! how one couple can do so much for so little, yet Hillary on love it or list can never do much with a lot of $$$$$, that show is ridiculous!

I gave up on HGTV..all the same and no actual style sense..except their one style. But stumbled upon Fixer Upper and really like it..Though it too is wearing thin do to the repeated same style again and again and again. Knock out walls and a kit. island and letters on the wall. And some people actually do take baths!! Does no one put real art on their walls? And what about an elegant style? And do they really need granite counter tops? Find a problem and running short on $$$..how about no granite??Crikey!!

I would love to see an adaptable professional designer who asks what style the owner likes...who also maybe has some class and a broader style sense? Something different from show to show..Some of the vary early decor remodel shows did do this. But these owners and contractors/designers are on "reality" TV! "Nuf said LOL

Lara Rossignol, that was Joan Steffend, and her voice always bother me ! I felt like she always needed to blow her nose.

I like to watch Chip and JoAnna, sometimes. Nicole Curtis, sometimes. Just can't take any of them for too long.

Right now I like Texas Flip and Move.

sreedesq

I
really enjoyed the Sarah Richardson and Candice Olsen shows and wish
HGTV would return to those.

________________________________________

Up until recently, HGTV has been running Candice's show at 5:30am on Mon mornings with a 5 minute info commercial inserted before the reveal.

For awhile there I believe they were all new shows.

Check out that early morning timeslot.

Those shows sound too violent for my tastes. I refuse to watch any of those shows unless they can certify that no actual houses were harmed during the filming.

I happened upon a show called Rafterhouse this morning. 2 young couples re-imagine ranch style houses. Some unique and practical design choices. I would watch it again, for sure.

Last weekend Sarah and Tommy were at an antiques fair close by and I had the opportunity to see them. She said she is hoping her latest show, Sarah's Cottage Rental, which has already aired in Canada, will be shown in the US. We can only hope. I didn't realize that the farmhouse she renovated she actually lived in. Loved many of the rooms in the house.

Texas Flip and Move takes the worst stereotype of Texans and runs with it. (Not all of us who are native to the state have that drawl.) That said, I can't resist watching whenever I come across it. In the last episode I watched, they were hauling a shed down the roads I take on my commute to work and I thought that was pretty cool!

I live in the neighborhood where Rafterhouse, and other flippers following the same formula, are ruining the very essence of what made the Arcadia area so desirable. Every time we drive by another old ranch-style home with a big billboard announcing that it is about to be "transformed" into another new Rafterhouse mini-McMansion, we shed a tear. Sometimes they gut the home, sometimes they flatten it (or leave a few walls up in order to get around being classified as new construction, and pay the extra permitting fees for that). I am hoping that HGTV does NOT pick this pilot up. Please, HGTV - don't encourage more of this type of tragic blanding of our neighborhoods. Oh boy! Another faux-farmhouse, faux-industrial heap...

It's early 2016 and one of the first homes chosen by Fixer Upper to be redone was an old asbestos siding house (green). I was very interested to see what they were going to do because that siding is almost ubiquitous in the South in modest homes. Interestingly at the end of the show the outside color of the house was blue and some type of new siding. Not a mention of replacing that asbestos siding, the cost, the environmental problems, nothing! These people paid practically nothing for a ruined house and Chip and Joannah made it beautiful. I'm sorry but I just don't believe the fairy tale. Complete restoration and furniture and the works for so little cost? What is included in the estimates and what's not? I don't think any furniture is included. And I don't think the cost of any labor is included. What do you think or know? Let us hear from remodelers.

I had to turn off Fixer Upper today because of Chip. He was eating a cockroach, a lizard and various disgusting things. I barely tolerate his childish behavior because I like Jo so much, but today was the limit. Even my husband said " shut it off ".

I've been pondering this, but have decided to make this comment. On one show Jo made a horrible remark, "Let's get this monstrosity out of here"......talking about a walk-in tub. I thought that was rather callous attitude to take. There was nothing wrong with that tub, just not one she thought was attractive. There are many people with disabilities that need a tub like that. Why shame them for having it in their homes?

Just thought it was a classless and thoughtless statement. And, yes, I get tired of the same look in every home they redo. Tearing out perfectly good cabinets in the kitchen instead of re-purposing them is a waste.

I watched the B&B caretakers' cottage show last night. The new layout was good, although the tiny kitchen nook/desk? Joanna kept emphasizing for the grandchildren was a pointless and outmoded feature, IMO. The decor tracked the B&B pretty closely, which one would expect.

The fakeness (is that a word?) of pretending the couple had not already signed a contract to run the business was ridiculous. Chip said something like "we heard through friends you might be interested in running our business," and then everyone tried to make it seem that the house renovation is what would seal the deal. Why couldn't they have just said, "here are Jane and John Doe, we have hired them as onsite managers of our new business venture and now need to create a place for them to live out of this old dump."

They did a lovely job on the house exterior but I am really getting tired of shiplap. And slab wood open shelving. And rusted galvanized baskets nailed to the wall. In last week's segment they made a big deal about a custom hanging kitchen herb garden, and it was obvious from the video that the new owner could not reach beyond the first row of pots because of how high Joanna hung it on the wall....for looks, of course. The decor is not my taste but I do love seeing renovations, of ranches especially,. They make up a good part of our country's housing stock and I am glad to see good houses renovated instead of razed for new construction.

So, nobody else is bothered by Chip and Joanna's antiquated views on gender roles? They're nice people and they actually like each other which is also nice, but this isn't 1950. Joanna and the girls make the cookies and Chip and the boys haul tree clippings to the dumpster. Really? If I hear "happy wife, happy life" one more time I may throw up.

I miss Candace and Sarah and David when he was in SF (didn't much care for the decorating in Miami). I really liked Curb Appeal in both Atlanta and the Bay Area. I do enjoy Income Property. Is Amy Matthews coming back from maternity leave?

Amy Matthews doesn't seem to be into reno any more. She and her activist husband are into social issues. The last time I saw her, she wasn't the wholesome looking person she used to be. She looked haggard, thin, and anorexic.....advertising for Home Advisor. In addition, she appears to have ruined her face with plastic surgery, multiple rhinoplasties, copious fillers in her cheeks and around her lips, and botox around her forehead and eyes, and flaming red hair. She doesn't look well.

They did a lovely job on the house exterior but I am really getting tired of shiplap. And slab wood open shelving. And rusted galvanized baskets nailed to the wall. In last week's segment they made a big deal about a custom hanging kitchen herb garden, and it was obvious from the video that the new owner could not reach beyond the first row of pots because of how high Joanna hung it on the wall....for looks, of course.

I am so over shiplap. Actually, I'm so over Joanna's one-note designs. My DH claims that the stuff she hangs on the wall is actual rubbish. Repurpose/reclaim? Sometimes you really do just need to throw old rusted, ruined items away for good.

That "custom" hanging herb garden? With the drainage holes in the pots and nothing to stop waiter and dirt from flowing on through? Yeah. Have fun keeping that alive (and clean).

LOL... I thought the same thing about the hanging herb garden. You'd have to take each pot out of the hanger, put it in the sink, water, let them drain, wait for them to dry, then put them all back. With small clay pots like that.. you'd be doing that a couple of times a week!

Yes, the wall herb garden Jo did was dumb and impractical.

I dislike when all the design shows do a plant feature on a kitchen wall where it's purely style over function

Maybe those iron thingies could hold bottles of booze instead.....a wall full of cheer, lol. A hanging bar is more practical than the set up as displayed.

Jen, I agree with your DH.

For the most part I think boredom, frustration sets in watching the current offerings on HGTV when one watches a marathon of them one after another. These shows are INFINITELY less obnoxious is you watch them one a week, maybe one a day..but the four hour back to back deal is a KILLER. That is where the Candace, Sarah, Bryan Baeumler shows stand out. I could watch one after the other all day. They weren't formulated the way the other's are. (well the one where Bryan gets to choose the room to fix was--my least favorite of his)

shows stand out.

I don't recall the pots even having drainage holes, and I know Joanna knows better.

suzanne_sl, they are a religious family, so their views on gender roles is not out of the norm. Not saying everyone is the same, but I know enough families that are very religious (various religions) that follow that rule of thumb (man is head of the house - not equals, gender specific roles - DH/DW and the children, etc). I honestly don't see anything wrong, if it is what they want to do. For me, it's the "who are we to judge?" aspect of saying it's wrong or bad. As with many things, it is not up to me to judge, as long as no one is being harmed.

To me, they come across as a family that portrays that sort of religious role acceptance, illustrated in the old opening credits in which Joanna and the kids stood admiring Chip as he did something with a hammer while she said "see how strong he is." He, in turn, calls her demeaning names like "big mama" and hits her with a football on camera and does not apologize. But in fact, she is obviously the brains and drive behind the organization----she is the one who opened the original shop, pushed to purchase the silos and turn them into a mercantile center, wanted to renovate the vacation rental, etc.. He would probably be a second tier remodeler if it weren't for her. Their real roles are anything but the traditional ones they espouse, but curiously, she seems to feel uncomfortable enough with her own ambition to attribute it to a voice from God, speaking directly to her with business instructions. She gave an interview in which she said exactly that.

Looks like drainage holes to me.

On another note, I did read a blog post that interviewed a recipient of one of their remodels. It sounded like a pretty positive experience overall. They mentioned that they were surprised and impressed with the quality of the renovations and that they do the entire house but only stage a few rooms, the ones we see. That they were gifted a few items that Joanne did especially for them but that they do have to buy most of the other staging stuff if they want to keep it.

They also said that Chip is pretty much how he appears on air while Joanne is pretty quiet but you can see she is always thinking about the reno and design. They did not become best friends with them, lol.

I suspect they are pretty busy people now with all they have going on with there little Wacko empire. Despite some of the many flaws, it is a big hit for the network. I tweeted a plea to bring the Sarah's Cottage Rental to the US. I think I'll post it on their Facebook too. I suggest you all do the same, I do think they might just consider it if they know there is an audience here that is tired of shiplap!

I loved the Sarah Richardson shows. They really made me think about broader design. I would have never tackled a mid century modern. But, she made it look so cool. I have an entirely new appreciation.

I'm not a neutral type of person. I have very traditional furniture that I started to collect in New Orleans. Neutral Pottery Barn won't work in my house. But, I really loved how Sarah taught you how to select fabrics and patterns.

I would love to see more of her. It's a pleasure to see a competent professional practice their craft.

Well I just did a post on the HGTV FB page https://www.facebook.com/HGTV/! Look for visitors on the left mine is on top right now. Pease add your thoughts, or post your own... i.e. squeaky wheel/oil etc.... :)

I have not seen her new line of furniture and accessories in person. What I see on the website does not look too different then what I have seen at Pottery Barn type places. Magnolia Home Furniture and Accessories

When a store not too far from us announced that they would be carrying her line it was mentioned in the article that it was a good fit because of the Christian Values that match between the retailer and the Gaines.

Plant City Observer article

Had not seen that picture, TR. At least they have drainage holes, but then the only thing that will "grow" in that spot are fake plants that won't need them.

Just took a look at their furniture line, most is not my taste at all. Some of the "Boho" which is heavily MCM inspired is ok...guess they want to cover all bases. Can't blame them.

I also am not a fan of her linen choices... the one on the B&B mangers bed was really awful. I'm pretty sure it was a sourced from Wayfair who is one of their sponsors.. so maybe her choices were limited.

I like some of the living room upholstery a lot, the three piece sectional looks very comfortable and I like most of the chairs. They have nice shapes and updated looks, very impressed with those. The other stuff is fairly predictable; IMO the big miss is the industrial line, which could have been called Early Dormitory.

It really bugs me when Joanna talks on her hand-held phone while driving. Not in my state.