Kirstie Allsopps homemade home - OS opinions?

nicki_2

I nearly choked as well. :eek:

I'm guessing I must be very lucky - I have an authentic hand stiched Canadian quilt.... it was made for me by a friend of the family when I had my DD - its 8 years old and is her "getting better blankie" as its only slightly bigger than cot size Even I've curled up under it on the sofa when I've been ill :rotfl::rotfl: I'd love to have a go at quilting, but I just don't have the time or patients :rotfl::rotfl:

jollymummy

I watched this for the first time this week and like a lot of you was amazed how much she was paying for stuff. The biggest problem I had though was I was constantly distracted by her wellies. I think she must have worn 6 different pairs throughout the programme. It's not a good sign when I'm more interested in her footwear, but that could be a reflection on my wondering mind!
Thought some of the `skills' she learnt were interesting but would have enjoyed the programme more if it had had more crafty content iyswim.

zarazara

I really enjoy the programme. there are some great ideas. I wonder if there will be a book? think if there is I'll buy it.

LandyAndy

This was AA Gill's review of the first episode in the Sunday Times.

Summed it up for me.

What to make of Kirstie Allsopp? The valkyrie of vacant possession, a strident, snorting hockey captain who, along with that fey bald bloke, made homes into game shows. I swing from feelings of embarrassed fondness to pillow-biting fury. Sometimes, I think she’s a bit of a lumpy treasure; at others, that she should be hanging from her own curtain tassels. Almost all the girls I’ve known all my life have been more or less like Kirstie. In a blaze of intimate self-publicity, she leapt from the sinking property market, abandoning the leftover bald bloke, and bought a derelict house in Devon, which she is doing up on a frayed, genteel shoestring, to show the rest of us how to have a cosy, tasteful recession.

The wondering about Kirstie is over. She has become a bosomy Wodehousian monster. Who on earth commissioned this format, of a middle-class, strident, plummy wife of a property millionaire, speculating on a £300,000 second home, who goes on to tell the mortgage-strapped, indebted, fearful workers that what they really ought to be doing is finding local artisans, throwing their own pots, blowing their own glasses, knitting their own toilet paper and going through the skips of their betters to make lovely, lovely, cosy, cosy, get-together light supper areas?

Kirstie’s Homemade Home is such a monstrously patronising piece of class-bound, lady-bountiful do-goodery that it would beggar Paul Whitehouse and Harry Enfield to come up with a more cynical satire. Kirstie has crossed the threshold to become one of television’s undead. She now believes that what she has to say is important, that it’s real, instead of being simply light entertainment. We can only hope she finds some darling, ever so clever little local ropemonger. What’s truly disappointing, but I suppose unsurprising, is that she has such class-bound, predictable taste. It looks like the Princess Diana memorial holiday home — what’s technically known as late-1990s naff.

Pssst

AA Gill put it far more eloquently than I but he neatly encompasses my feelings about Allsop and Phil.

DianneB

I thought the whole thing was very disappointing - but I am still mug enough to watch it from start to finish!! Isn't this what we all do anyway? but on a much smaller budget? Must admit to being taken with the tea cup candles, may try them for fun! BUT how many coats does that woman own??

sandy2_2

I´ve watched this programme twice. What I find irritating in the extreme is that she starts to ´try´a skill eg spinning her own wool/upholstery/patchwork, then gets the professional to make the rug/wallhanging/quilt etc for her. Say if you cost their work out a a minimum of £10ph it's ridiculous!!!!! The only project she seemed to have finished herself was painting the mirror pink, which she didn't like

tomterm8

Basically, the program is good in the bits someone who actually knows something about something gets to talk. When Kirstie is talking, it goes down hill.

Yeah, it's also fun counting how many coats she has, she must have spent more money on coats for the series than I've spend on clothes in my entire life.

Gigervamp

They are rather nice coats though.....

flissh

LandyAndy, thanks for posting that. All true. She is very jolly holly sticks. What I hate is the format all programs seem to follow now. At the start they tell you what is going to happen, small amount of action, then an ad break, then they recap again, then some more action, then an ad break, then.... You get the idea. In total the unsaid, new bits of the prog could be presented in half the time,and they could cut out all the repetition. They all seem to do it now though, no wonder radio listening has gone up in the UK.