Hands down my pick is the guest bedroom that the designer turned into a graveyard. Oh sure, she said it was supposed to be a garden, but it was, in fact, a grave. The neighbor was aghast when the designer (I don’t remember which one- it was a woman) made a grass and flower bedspread and then surrounded the bed with a white picket fence. I said to myself “It looks like a grave.” Said the neighbor “It looks like a grave!” Said the house owner “It kinda looks like a grave.” And then she pretended to like it.
Anything by that new designer Christi has a chance to top the grave. Time will tell.
In terms of sheer, wanton destruction, the “hay (or straw) wall” episode certainly has to be right up there—IIRC, it cost over $3,000 to repair the mayhem to the fireplace and bookcases, not to mention the 70+ hours it took to remove the wall “treatment.”
But when it comes to design disasters, I would nominate a Season 1 room by Dez that involved a diamond pattern all over one wall. Burned me retinas, it did.
It was the Hildibeest’s room, and it was horrible beyond description. If it had been my room, I would have outdone Crying Pam, the woman who cried when Doug painted her room crap brown and covered up her fireplace.
The episode where the HO did not want ANYTHING Orental, then I think it was Genevieve, based all the room around an Obi and painted on wall with rust paint.
I also second the “Moss” room…ick!
How about the plastic palm fonds on the ceiling fan? I think that was Kia. IIRC HO hated ceiling fans:D
My first thought was the straw room, but I’d forgotten about the quadrant room. To be fair though, the quadrant room was for a young, hap’nin’ San Francisco couple (if I’m remembering correctly) who actually WANTED something like that.
I think Kia’s worst room by far was the camoflage/“military chic” room. (For the military family who wanted NOTHING MILITARY!!!) The one with a box plunked in the middle of the room with an electric fire in it? WTF?!?! Most really bad rooms have at least a few interesting ideas or redeeming features; not this one. 100% bad from top to bottom.
The episode is Oakland: Webster Street from Season 2. The “before&after” feature wouldn’t work for me in IE, but would in Opera; perhaps you’ll have better luck.
I also highly recommend the TwoP Recap of the show—it’s a classic.
You know, if you didn’t like the decor that’s fine. But since the HOs apparently did, and apparently had no objection to the supposedly stereotypical decor, I for one would appreciate your not presuming to speak for what is or isn’t offensive to gay people. Thanks ever so.
Has to be Kia’s Military Chic room. Even if we pretend for a minute that it was oppisite day, and that when the female HO said “I don’t want anything military at all. I spend all day in the military, when I come home, I want something different,” she meant “an uber-ugly black and grey camo wallpaper boarder would be faboo!” it’s an absolutely hideous room.
And I’m sure the rest of us won’t mind if you would stop inventing things our of the air to complain about. Where in Guin’s post did she suggest it had to be offensive to gay people?
It was a terrible, terrible design, and the stereotypical approach was part of what made it bad. Deal with it.
This one gets my vote for sheer ugliness, with Hildi’s recent Hell’s Dining Room a close second, and the Graveyard Bedroom third.
For destructive-worst, the Hay Wall and the Bathroom Flowers have to be tied for the worst. I don’t know that there are any estimates on fixing the one where she stapled 6,000 fake flowers to the bathroom walls, but 24,000 tiny holes in a steamy, moist room is not a good idea. Plus, there’s just no way to clean them. Can you imagine how filthy those flowers would be, with the steam and dust and overspray from deodorant and hairpspray?
From the Television without Pity recap about the hay episode (linked above by OttoDaFe:
"Of course, one can read in the media since this show aired about how the bookshelves that were put up were pulling away from the wall within twenty-four hours; the kids had splinters from the louvers, which were promptly removed; and the homeowners were given an estimate of $3000 to restore the mantel. Not to mention the eighty-five hours of labour it took to remove the hay. "
Yikes!
Have they ever rerun this episode? It would definitely be one I would want to see.
The Hay Wall show was just recently shown about 2 weeks ago on one of the Thursday repeats. I had never seen it, and so I was thrilled to see it. I’ve enver seen the Moss Wall, so I’m keeping an eye open for that.
The end result wasn’t quite as bad as I expected, but it was really stupid-looking. I mean, come on, HAY, glued to the freaking wall? What kind of moron thinks that’s a good idea?
