Grand Designs’ crumbling ruin
Filming is well under way for Grand Designs NZ season five, and we have been told to expect some goodies.
Let’s hope we see some of those great off-the-wall projects that have been the hallmark of the UK series, which has been running for nearly 20 years. Because some of the local offerings in recent years have not been exciting.
We do know there will be a South Island house that is suspended like a glass bridge over a creek. And MediaWorks confirms there is also a grand property being built to resemble a medieval castle, and a house that is being clad in shou sugi ban, a traditional Japanese burnt-wood cladding.
No doubt there will be some drama about the fire risk there.
We will also get a glimpse into one of Auckland’s most historical CBD properties, where a stunning New York-style penthouse is being built.
Of course, the show won’t be screening until later in the year, but in the meantime we have the latest season of Grand Designs UK, starting on Thursday on Three.
And the first project in the lineup is a beauty.
Young Spanish architect Jaime Fernandez and his wife Mimi embark on an epic mission to convert a Grade II-listed folly in Buckinghamshire into a family home.
Originally designed to exhibit a fossil collection, but gutted by fire and abandoned for the last 200 years, the crumbling ruin is a fascination for the couple.
Giving themselves a wildly optimistic six-month deadline to finish the project before the birth of their second child (isn’t that always the way?) it’s not long before they hit trouble.
The Saxon burial ground the
folly is built on throws up some macabre surprises – we are guessing there will be bones.
Then the couple’s stonemasons from Madrid let them down, and local builders with no restoration experience have to take on the crumbling stonework.
Fernandez puts all his energies and creativity into the project, using innovative 3D mapping to squeeze living spaces into the tower, but it’s an exhausting struggle.
With money running out, the contract on their rented accommodation running out, and the imminent birth, the pressure to move in proves almost unbearable.
Other projects in the UK include one that Grand Designs guru Kevin McCloud told us he was filming late last year – a story about a couple building a hypoallergenic home, as they try to alleviate their two young sons’ life-threatening allergies.
‘‘It’s a wild and wonderful healthy house in London, for a family with two children who are extremely allergic,’’ McCloud told Stuff.
‘‘Their illness is so severe the family has had to move next to the hospital.
‘‘They are building a healthy home with its own ventilation system and no volatile organic compounds – all those things. York and Cambridge universities are both involved. It’s a really radical and exciting project.’’
There’s also a story about a family looking to build a giant American modernist house inspired by a cult 80s film, and another episode has two identical twins building identical houses raised on stilts.
Bring it on!
Grand Designs UK will screen on Three on Thursdays, 7.30pm