Can any of us imagine home improvement before Bob Vila? Perhaps Pete Seeger’s 1960’s send-up sets the scene the best: “Little boxes on the hillside…they’re all made out of ticky-tacky and they all look just the same”. Housing in the last half of the twentieth century had become industrial, impersonal, and homogeneous; old buildings were rejected, neglected, or torn down, and homeowners were expected to accept the new cookie-cutter layouts offered them without even considering their actual needs and tastes. Just as Baby Boomers were growing up enough to buy houses, along came a man who told them: you don’t have to take this. You CAN build what you want. You CAN revive an older house to suit your personality. You CAN give your family more space. You CAN express your individuality through color and style…as long as you have the knowledge to use what works! And he set about giving them that knowledge.
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The year was 1979, long before the big box home stores sprang up throughout suburbia and began calling all homeowners in for classes and clinics on home improvement. Just outside of Boston, a carpenter and craftsman with an eye for classic details stepped in front of the camera. He introduced himself as Bob Vila, the host of THIS OLD HOUSE. The rest is history: an entire generation of weekend warriors tuned in and strapped on the tool belts, and the empowered American homeowner was born. Their children grew up with Bob on the screen and today’s Gen-Xers promise to be the most prolific investors in home improvement ever. From this initial seed sprang an entire genre of home improvement TV shows, an entire retail industry, and indeed a revived preservation movement. In 1989, Bob departed public broadcasting for another groundbreaking endeavor: the launch of the first commercial television home improvement show, BOB VILA’S HOME AGAIN. Today—twenty-five years later—Bob has continued to show his viewers just how good it can get.
Bob’s special knack for imparting not just his love of power tools but also his love of good design and the decorative arts has created yet another phenomenon. Whether it’s hand-blocked wallpaper, reclaimed timber flooring, an exuberantly stenciled border, or re-upholstered salvaged furniture, we have been exposed to such a wide variety of ways to customize our homes that our weekend to-do lists will never be the same. Suddenly, gracious homes and fine finishes are no longer the exclusive domain of the rich and famous. Not that that group is ignored: Bob’s signature “field trips” on Home Again are the window onto their world that have allowed us to bring home the souvenirs of inspiration. Wilton carpet, hand-sewn silk drapes, priceless Colonial antiques, Frank Lloyd Wright stained glass, and Meissen porcelain are all brought right into our own living rooms as Bob takes us inside the historic homes that hold the roots of the way we live today.
As important as it is to learn from the past, Bob has always been a strong proponent of the technological evolution of the building industry. A home’s comfort, durability, ease of maintenance, and energy efficiency are even more important than its looks, and are irrevocably linked to the soundness of the materials that go into its construction. From insulation to HVAC and energy efficiency issues, engineered lumber to roofing, to recycling technology and sustainable forestry, innovations in building materials are being developed and tested every day. Bob’s mission is to give homeowners the tools to assess what’s appropriate for their project and budget: to create an educated consumer who can distinguish the latest fad from truly responsible building science.
Bob has tackled a total of 30 projects in the fifteen seasons that BOB VILA’S HOME AGAIN has been on the air, and they are as varied as the ways in which Americans live today. From the very first little authentic Cape Cod cape, the affordable housing and Habitat for Humanity efforts in Boston and New York, the urban pioneering projects in Chicago and Providence, to the suburban ranch expansions, super-sized colonials, Shingle Style revivals and Craftsman bungalow projects, the underlying theme has been the same: plan carefully, respect history, and build for the future. Whether you’re building a farmhouse in Vermont, remodeling a condo in Miami Beach, or just adding a deck, the principles are the same and the effect is contagious.
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