HGTV darlings Chip and Joanna Gaines return with a ‘Fixer Upper’ spinoff
A new ‘Fix’: After HGTV announced that “Fixer Upper” would air its final season this year, it looked like we would lose Chip and Joanna Gaines forever. Happily, however, one of the most endearing couples of the network’s renovation scene is back with new footage and behind-the-scenes moments with “Fixer Upper: Behind the Design,” premiering Tuesday, April 10.
Touted as a companion series to “Fixer Upper,” “Behind the Design” delivers detailed insights into the strategies and thought processes behind Joanna’s final designs of the rooms she decorates and stages in the show. Each half-hour episode examines the overhaul from start to finish, revealing how the “Fixer Upper” team meets its clients’ needs and style preferences, while staying on budget.
The Gaineses are nothing if not busy. Besides “Fixer Upper,” and now, “Behind the Design,” Joanna also has her own digital series, “Design on Her Mind.” In it, she shares her passion for design strategy and decorating decisions, showing how she makes Waco, Texas, beautiful one home at a time. It’s no wonder that reno-loving viewers can’t get enough Gaines.
The couple has worked together for years, with Chip managing construction and Joanna handling the design side of home renovations. They’ve been nailing home improvement projects since they got married more than a decade ago, launching a handful of successful ventures, including their Magnolia Market franchise.
Nor is home improvement their only enterprise. They’ve started on the final stages of their new restaurant, The Elite Café, a historic Waco landmark that was originally in operation from 1919 to 2016. Chip told Southern Living that the Texan restaurant would be a “breakfast joint,” because that’s his jam.
Somehow, they’ve still managed to balance all of this success with raising their four lovely children, with a fifth on the way later this year. Of course, Chip’s sense of humor and Joanna’s down-to-earth mentality helps the waters run smoothly. They’re a couple who know how to support one another and benefit from each other’s strengths, making them a talented and complementary team. The two fell in love in 2001 and got hitched two years later, and opened the first Magnolia Market in 2003.
According to the Magnolia Market website, it was during this time working in the store that Joanna developed and honed her personal design style and abilities. It allowed her to flourish as a business owner and gain some “much needed confidence” that she’d put to good use in “Fixer Upper.” After their first two kids came along, however, maintaining the store got a bit heavy. They closed the market, focusing instead on their construction business, Magnolia Homes, which was easier to manage with a family.
Shortly after getting the business started, they signed on for HGTV’s “Fixer Upper.” The series became an instant hit with audiences because of the Gaineses’ ability to create a meaningful and informative narrative. For example, season 5 of “Fixer Upper” includes an episode where the Gaineses help a woman fix up her house after her husband’s passing, helping her turn her space into a cozy cottage, and the transformation is priceless.
The joy that the Gaineses get from their work, and the impact that their work has on the lives of others, makes the show unique in HGTV’s couple-centric renovation lineup. Plus, Chip’s obsession with his weird hairdos has been a trip.
The new series kicks off a week after the “Fixer Upper” finale, with each new episode following a rerun of its companion episode. Go deep behind the scenes with “Fixer Upper: Behind the Design,” premiering Tuesday, April 10, on HGTV.
Troubled waters: Our rivers are under attack, and Jeremy Wade sees that as a warning sign to intervene. The extreme angler wants to raise awareness of a natural resource that many of us take for granted — our beautiful rivers — and he’s going straight to the source. “Jeremy Wade’s Mighty Rivers” premieres Sunday, April 8, on Animal Planet.
The six-part series follows Wade as he documents how a variety of the world’s key waterways have changed over the years. He explores the Amazon in Brazil, the Ganges in India, the Yangtze in China, the Mississippi in the U.S., the Danube in central and eastern Europe, and the Zambezi in Africa. Wade hopes to get to the bottom of each river’s prognosis and gauge the present and long-term impact on its surrounding communities.
A writer and biologist, Wade specializes in travel and natural history, but his heart truly belongs to the water. That may be because he’s wild about fishing, though his interest in lakes and rivers delves much deeper.
Since his early career, he’s investigated mysterious aquatic monsters. In 1994, he discovered a strange animal in an Amazon lake. After waiting five weeks for the creature to return, Wade finally managed to snap a photo, which he sent to the BBC’s Natural History Unit. The creature defied classification, baffling scientists. That was all it took to hook Wade, and he decided to investigate more monsters. In “River Monsters” and “Jungle Hooks,” he examines the legend of the Loch Ness Monster and the Amazonian Arapaima (a monstrous fish notorious for attacking fishermen), among other tales of watery enigmas.
Now Wade’s taking on a bigger monster than anything before: the destruction of our rivers. He’s hoping his message may protect our waterways from further harm, and we hope he’s right. Find out more about the threats to this precious resource on Sunday, April 8, when “Jeremy Wade’s Mighty Rivers” premieres on Animal Planet.