Design Star: back on track

My favorite TV show, Design Star, redeemed itself from last week’s awful kitchen challenge. Phew! There really was nowhere to go but up, since the contestants embarrassed themselves and the show. Now my favorite designers are back in the lead, and can you believe that Torie, everybody’s weak link, is right up there with them!

This week’s challenge was my favorite: the white room, where each designer starts off with an identical white space. It’s a total blank slate, and a perfect opportunity for each designer to showcase their talent, imagination and ability to execute their design.

And—are you ready? All the design elements had to be purchased from a grocery store. Who dreams up these things? These producers are insane! They must be laughing their butts off, coming up with ideas to make things as difficult and high-stress as possible.

The top three rooms selected by the judges were my exact picks. My favorite was Dan, who raided the produce aisle and chose apples as his main design element. He created a very moody, sophisticated, rich-looking room in reds and browns. It was phenomenal. Vern Yip said it was the most thought-out room he’d ever seen on Design Star—total high praise, and well deserved.

Nathan painted his walls a matte black and dripped milk down them to create an interesting striped effect. Then he strung up his own fresh orange chandelier, which totally killed. Those strings of sliced oranges must have made the room smell divine!

But the shocker was Torie, who was voted onto the show by her fellow contestants because they thought she’d be easy to beat. Last week when the designers were choosing their kitchen teams, Torie was chosen dead last.

Well guess what? Torie totally stepped up and pulled off a hip, young space, with vibrant colors that went from magenta and yellow to black and white zebra stripes on the floor. She even scrunched up garbage bags and colorful napkins to make some bold wall art that everybody was asking about. A bit crazy, yet not chaotic, because there was uniformity in the stripes and balance in the colors.

The rest of the group was mediocre at best. But let’s face it. I know I’d be hard-pressed to come up with ideas for decorating with cereal boxes and fruit!

Again, I have to give it to the judges. They voted out Jen, the color specialist, who never proved her ability in what was supposed to be her strong suit. She tried to be eclectic and create this contemporary Japanese room, but the colors didn’t work, her idea fell flat, and her scale and proportion were off. Her room amounted to scatterings of little things, and there was really nothing to draw your eye in.

I can’t wait for the next episode. Unfortunately, that’s going to have to wait until I get back from my trip. I’m mixing business with pleasure—this is our family vacation, but I’ll also be teaching a home decorating workshop aboard the Crystal Serenity. I’ll be posting photos as we go along.

But first, AAARGHHH! I’ve got to get back to my packing!

It's gonna be good!

Did you tune in on Sunday night to HGTV’s Design Star? If you didn’t, you missed out—the show was fabulous! It blew away last season by a mile, and let me tell you why: Everything was better—the judges, the contestants, and the design. And the home that they’re staying in!

Judges Candace Olsen, Vern Yip and Genevieve Gorder were brutally honest, fair and very helpful in their critiques. One contestant even mentioned in the waiting room after being ripped to shreds that she learned more listening to the judges than she had in school.

All in all, the contestants seem better, stronger and more interesting than last season’s lot. I’ll just mention what I thought were the best and worst designs of the week.

First, the worst. NataLee and Tashica’s room was unfinished and poorly executed. Crybaby NataLee got booted off, and deservedly so. However, I do not believe they had the worst design. They had a decent concept and design, they just could not execute it well. I still think Natalie should have been voted off, but in my opinion the worst design belonged to Jason and Jen. They tried to be unique and interesting, but their design fell flat. After they explained, in response to puzzled questions, that the room was designed with a National Geographic writer in mind, Candace Olsen even said that no space should have to be explained. It didn’t make any sense, it wasn’t functional, and it wasn’t designed well. There was one lonely chair in a corner, a chair at a desk was way too small. A room can be interesting and over the top, but still cohesive.

The best design, hands down, belonged to Dan and Nathan. My prediction: These will be the guys to beat. They both seemed cool and collected, had good vision and execution, they worked well together, and right away came up with the brilliant idea of going bold with a wall mural that Nathan drew from one wall down to the floor and up the other wall. Simply amazing. Dramatic, beautiful and in his word, chaotic.

They balanced that chaotic feel with wood planks on an adjacent wall that added something natural and with more symmetry. And Dan built a big, bold, white dining table that grounded the space and created balance, because it was such a big space with a lot of chaotic pattern. It blew me away. All the judges loved it.

The worst idea of the show was allowing the 10 contestants to pick their 11th cast mate. They brought in three more design contestants, each said a few words and showed their body of work and credentials. Then the 10 contestants cast their blind votes. Obviously they weren’t going to pick the best possible challenger. They voted in the least threatening, who became the final contestant, Torie. The strongest one by far, who should have been on the show, was the brunette.

So, if you didn’t get a chance to tune in, I’m telling you, this is a show to watch! Check it out this Sunday night—and let me know what you thought!