What a exciting time this was, taping the episodes for the upcoming BBC season of House of the Year. Thought I’d give you a glimpse of the goings on behind the scenes. This is when we were taping for the beginning of each series where they’re introducing us as the judges. I had to stand extremely still for about two minutes (felt like days) while the camera panned from the top my head down to my feet. When you blink your eyes you need to do it very slowly because when they edit it into the actual series they speed up the tape – that makes it look as if you’re blinking normally.
The producers of HOTY are Carol O’Kane and Feargal O’Kane. I’m so fortunate to have them as the producers of my first show on BBC. The show was Feargal’s concept and vision, which you can tell immediately by his passion for the show. Here they are:
Our host, Lawrence Llewellyn Bowen, is an incredibly talented presenter and knows his craft well. It is an honor to work with him. This was his normal position when we were not taping. I told him he looked like a mink coat thrown over a chair.
One of my co- judges Des Ewing is an incredible architect who has built some of the most beautiful homes I’ve ever seen. I’m happy to be able to call him a new friend.
My other co- judge is Suzanne Garuda, an incredibly talented designer and artisan. Here we are caught in the bedroom, told to wait quietly while Lawrence was taping his segment. It was tough not to keep laughing, and we were scolded by the director at least once.
Here’s a photo of me discussing with Lawrence the differences between the term “throw pillow” and “cushion”. Stateside of course we call the little ones throw pillows and the big ones cushions, but in the UK they call the little pillows cushions. Tomato – tom-ah-to, we finally just called the whole thing off.
Just for kicks I took a moment to see what it would feel like behind the camera – see me below standing in for one of our camera crew and as the director in the booth. I think I’ll stick to what I’m doing right now and save all of this techie stuff for another day.
Below, a sneak peek at the set for the finale. We’re just getting ready to go on. This is taped live in front of all of the contestants. It was very exciting – everyone was on pins and needles.
I’d like to thank everyone at BBC and in Northern Ireland for making me feel so welcome and so at home. I hope that those of you who can see the series will enjoy it asmuch as we enjoyed making it. The show is premiering on January 9 on BBC1 and on January 12 on BBC2. At the present time it’s only available in the UK. But I’m hoping it’ll come to the US as well.
In the adjacent dining room area there was a pass-through into the kitchen which I didn’t care for. I disguised it with a multilayer treatment. Closest to the wall is a deep burgundy velvet drapery panel which I overlaid with floor-to-ceiling golden aluminum bead chain. Between the fabric and the bead chain I placed a row of tiny lights channeled in the ceiling that at night creates a wall of shimmering gold.
The decanters are from Cristal Saint Louis and are extremely glamorous. The metal pieces are from 
