'Top Design': the green challenge
Guest blogger Karen Shih recaps the latest episode of Top Design:
I fell asleep during the initial airing of this week's episode, so I'm watching it at 1 a.m. for the rerun. If this blog sounds a little incoherent, well, there you go.
This week, Top Design goes green! The intro shows the designers getting ready, and Eddie's getting a little bitter and maybe a little cocky. He hates that Nathan is winning and he's not, but he's all, I work for Martha Stewart, and Martha only hires the best.
So booyah, essentially.
The contestants' task is to redesign the offices of the Cadmus Group, an environmental consulting firm. The guest judge is Danny Seo, a leading green designer. For the challenge, they have to use everything in the office to redesign it and use green paint and scraps, instead of bolts, of fabric.
They meet the people whose offices they're redesigning and go off to shop. But when they come back, there's a twist: They have to switch keys with another designer and use the materials that the previous designer bought. Ooh, tricky. All of them seem pretty set in their own ways, despite their clients' preferences, so who knows how this'll turn out.
Wisit, in his smiley, gentle way, talks about taking a match to Natalie's stuff, which he has inherited. Oh, Wisit.
There are some pretty heinous materials to work with this time, like drab office carpeting. There's strange stuff that has to be left on the walls (some sort of shelf-y electronic thing?), and it's hard to imagine that the office as a whole is going to be coherent at all if each designer gets his or her way.
The designing process is never easy to describe. Most of the competitors seem frazzled, particularly Angela and Wisit. Eddie doesn't want to help Angela out very much, and Wisit just doesn't care to work with any of Natalie's materials. When they wrap up a day-and-a-half's worth of work, Eddie's room turns out super creative. He uses carpet padding for the walls, as a natural board, and he uses the old blinds from the windows as a funky covering for the lighting. It looks gorgeous!
Natalie's is kind of drab and dark (she's working with the colors Angela got), but she tries to spice it up with some college-dormlike cloth panels that seem very out of place. Wisit's room is just a hot mess. It's kind of boring blue and ugly, with some weird cloth draped sloppily over random chairs, and he can't say that he did anything actually green.
Ondine's room has an awesome chandelier made out of water bottles, and overall her room looks simple and usable, if a little effeminate (given Wisit's color selection). Nathan's room has the most effectively dramatic color of any of the rooms. He has a dark green accent wall, and creatively uses parts of the old desk as shelves on the adjacent wall.
Preston's room looks very tailored and classic. It's blue, like a lot of the other rooms, but he has some interesting white stripes pulling everything together. Angela's room is strangely bright blue (Eddie's choice), but her task was hard, because she had to hide the computer stuff on the wall and had to work in a pretty small space.
The judges say Nathan's room was "industrial chic," Preston's was refined and the bookcase was well-styled, and Eddie's green choices "ingenious." Eddie wins! He's kind of full of himself, but he definitely has some good designs.
The bottom two are Wisit and Natalie. The judges call Wisit a one-trick pony and call him out for not using any green tactics. As for Natalie, they think she's still unsophisticated, and they're not a fan of the "condo" feel of the office, with the throw pillows in the window seat and the fabric panels on the wall.
Sadly, Wisit goes home. I guess he and Natalie have had decent results throughout the competition, but I really felt like he had more potential than Natalie. Her designs look like Target ads or something. Oh, well.
In a suitably strange and Wisit-y ending, he sings us out. So sad.
Next week: Some dramatic happens. Ooh, new and original!
They meet the people whose offices they're redesigning and go off to shop. But when they come back, there's a twist: They have to switch keys with another designer and use the materials that the previous designer bought. Ooh, tricky. All of them seem pretty set in their own ways, despite their clients' preferences, so who knows how this'll turn out.
Wisit, in his smiley, gentle way, talks about taking a match to Natalie's stuff, which he has inherited. Oh, Wisit.
There are some pretty heinous materials to work with this time, like drab office carpeting. There's strange stuff that has to be left on the walls (some sort of shelf-y electronic thing?), and it's hard to imagine that the office as a whole is going to be coherent at all if each designer gets his or her way.
The designing process is never easy to describe. Most of the competitors seem frazzled, particularly Angela and Wisit. Eddie doesn't want to help Angela out very much, and Wisit just doesn't care to work with any of Natalie's materials. When they wrap up a day-and-a-half's worth of work, Eddie's room turns out super creative. He uses carpet padding for the walls, as a natural board, and he uses the old blinds from the windows as a funky covering for the lighting. It looks gorgeous!
Natalie's is kind of drab and dark (she's working with the colors Angela got), but she tries to spice it up with some college-dormlike cloth panels that seem very out of place. Wisit's room is just a hot mess. It's kind of boring blue and ugly, with some weird cloth draped sloppily over random chairs, and he can't say that he did anything actually green.
Ondine's room has an awesome chandelier made out of water bottles, and overall her room looks simple and usable, if a little effeminate (given Wisit's color selection). Nathan's room has the most effectively dramatic color of any of the rooms. He has a dark green accent wall, and creatively uses parts of the old desk as shelves on the adjacent wall.
Preston's room looks very tailored and classic. It's blue, like a lot of the other rooms, but he has some interesting white stripes pulling everything together. Angela's room is strangely bright blue (Eddie's choice), but her task was hard, because she had to hide the computer stuff on the wall and had to work in a pretty small space.
The judges say Nathan's room was "industrial chic," Preston's was refined and the bookcase was well-styled, and Eddie's green choices "ingenious." Eddie wins! He's kind of full of himself, but he definitely has some good designs.
The bottom two are Wisit and Natalie. The judges call Wisit a one-trick pony and call him out for not using any green tactics. As for Natalie, they think she's still unsophisticated, and they're not a fan of the "condo" feel of the office, with the throw pillows in the window seat and the fabric panels on the wall.
Sadly, Wisit goes home. I guess he and Natalie have had decent results throughout the competition, but I really felt like he had more potential than Natalie. Her designs look like Target ads or something. Oh, well.
In a suitably strange and Wisit-y ending, he sings us out. So sad.
Next week: Some dramatic happens. Ooh, new and original!
