Every forever home has its own story
and we can't wait to help tell it.
It's been in my family, you know, for generations.
Let me smash! Let me smash!
[man 1] This is the next step.
[woman 1] The next chapter in my life.
-[woman 2] Hiyah! -[man 2] Love it. Whoo!
[Drew] After you.
Welcome home.
-[woman 3] Oh, my goodness! -[man 3] Look at this!
Oh, wow.
[man 4] Let's go!
It feels like home.
Argh!
Come around for a group hug.
[Drew] Linda really made the sacrifice for our relationship
because my commute was traveling all around the country.
I think that's 'cause she married you. That's definitely a sacrifice.
[Drew] Yeah, that is, yeah.
Location. Location. Location.
I know that was, kind of, the tipping point for these guys.
They wanted to make sure the commute was gonna be reasonable.
Brian and Lily found the perfect house.
[Jonathan] That's a beautiful spot.
We are newlyweds.
We got married about two months ago.
Lily and I met online and clicked right away.
[Lily] We shared a love of music and travel.
[Brian] I proposed on the beach in Maui.
As I was proposing, a giant sea tortoise came out of the ocean.
[Lily] Both of us have jobs that brought us to LA.
I'm a musician with the Los Angeles Philharmonic.
This house is 10 to 15 minutes from both of my two work venues,
which in LA is worth its weight in gold.
Currently in our house with us is our beautiful pup, Moose.
We've had him four years now.
[Brian] We just feel like it's somewhere we can set down roots
and raise a couple kids, maybe, down the road.
But the layout is not very functional.
I need to get into the dishwasher.
[Lily] It is way too small.
Everything is builder grade in finish.
[Brian] The cabinet faces look nice but the actual boxes
on the interior are falling apart.
I would say it tests our patience daily.
[Brian] There's a lot of emotional attachment to the house.
We've had a lot of big life milestones here together.
And so, the space means a lot to us.
[Lily] We even delayed our honeymoon so we could take on this renovation.
With a little bit of love, we feel like we absolutely can raise a family here
and really, really make this our true forever, forever, forever home.
I am officially jealous of Lily and Brian's view. Look at that.
[Jonathan] They picked the right spot. This is gorgeous.
[knocks on door]
-[Drew and Jonathan] Hello! -Hello.
We're selling door-to-door renovations. Interested?
-Absolutely, come on in. -Yeah, please come on in.
-How you guys doing? -[Brian] Good.
Good to see you guys.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, wowie, wow.
Look at that view.
That view is incredible.
[Brian] This is definitely why we bought the house.
This was the first thing we saw when we walked in
-and we knew this, uh, this could be the home for us. -Yeah.
Do you ever think of just getting a zipline that goes straight down the canyon?
Every day.
I can see how you woo Lily.
-Just over here, you turn on the fireplace. -[Lily] Right.
You have the view, you play some low, sexy, romantic music.
[Brian and Lily laugh]
Now, when you're not performing for work, what's your go to?
Is it, like, heavy metal or something...
He was in a rock band when he was in high school so...
I sure was.
Whoa, so you liked him 'cause he's a bad boy.
He did surprise me with little snippets like that.
[Brian] So, the house is great in a lot of ways.
There are some other things that don't work quite as well for us.
Wait, when you said there's some things that don't work, you pointed at her.
-Yep. -Right.
[Jonathan] You can't change this, okay.
-Newly married, you know-- -I'm learning.
-All right. -We each have our different style, though.
I'm from LA, he's from Oregon, so he loves the craftsman home.
I love the, you know, mid-century modern, the Spanish style homes too.
So, he doesn't like, you know, going out of his comfort zone.
So, uh, we're excited that he has no control over that directly during this process.
This house is not that old, right?
I mean, this does scream
-early 2000s, late '90s... -[Lily] Yep.
...with the floor color, some of the choices, it's just...
I think we can do a lot more.
Make it feel fresh but most importantly make it feel like you.
-[Brian] Yeah. -One thing, with, you know, the kitchen, I noticed
it must be a little frustrating when you're, argh!
Why! Why!
Absolutely.
So weird, that they've literally chopped your usable space in half...
-[Lily] Yep. -...with a pointless wall.
To me, they're trying to create division between
your eating area and your lounging space.
But there are ways we can do that without putting
a giant pass-through in the middle here.
I suppose this is a needed post over here.
[Brian] If we could get rid of the post and open the floor
plan up, that would be really amazing.
[Jonathan] Do you entertain a little bit?
Best as we can with a four top table.
You'd have to decide though, do you want a formal dining table
or do you want more casual dining, like maybe a built-in banquette on an island?
I see beside the kitchen there is a pretty big, empty room.
You could convert that into dining space.
[Brian] That would be fantastic.
We never end up using it.
It's never been used since we've lived here.
The thing is, most people would be worried about losing an entire bedroom.
-I assume it's legally a bedroom? -Yep.
Because that can affect the value of the home, but again
it's how you guys are using it.
I think we're both okay losing a bedroom.
We have enough space upstairs for, if our family grows in the future.
And it's really space that's not usable right now.
[Jonathan] There would be structural work needed, removing the post
and the walls but it should be pretty straightforward.
[Drew] The kitchen we know does not work.
So, we can only expand in one of two ways.
Everything is just too small for anything we want to do in here.
-[Drew] Yeah, this definitely would be cramped. -[Lily] Right.
All of us being in here... Obviously it's a kitchen
where you can't have too many chefs in the kitchen.
This stone does not feel fresh.
The frustrating thing is you spend a lot of money
on some nice stone and it's in a layout that's terrible.
So, we need to change this.
Yeah, I agree.
You wanna have a kitchen that just feels bright and exciting and you wanna cook.
Who does the cooking in here?
I give him very specific instructions.
I try to chop vegetables as best as I can, but Lily is the, um,
artiste when it comes to, uh, making dinner.
I can see there's a dictatorship in this kitchen. Yeah.
They're your words, not mine.
[Drew laughs] Yeah.
And you have the one small pantry?
-Yes. -We have the one tiny pantry.
[Drew] Yeah, you're definitely lacking storage, we can change things.
Especially if you are interested in expanding the kitchen into this room.
How cool would it be to double or even triple the size of your kitchen?
Right now, that half wall and bedroom wall completely cut off your main floor.
If we took down both, we could expand your kitchen
all the way to the back bedroom.
You'd have a much bigger dining area
and an unobstructed flow right into your living room.
That would be amazing.
That would be exactly what we've always wanted
-in this house since we moved in. -Yep, absolutely.
-Okay. -[Brian] Yeah,
I feel like it would give us more flow out onto the deck
and then we'd be able to entertain
-all our friends that come over. -Right.
I think the function of this space
-would be really nice that way. -Okay.
Okay, I mean, there's a lot of room over here for the kitchen.
I can already imagine the kitchen expanding into this space.
[Jonathan] Oh, you get so much use out of this.
[Drew] Though the piano looks purposeful and it has the bench.
This sad little seat here by itself, is this yours?
[Brian] Yeah, that's mine, yeah.
But I think we definitely want at least some kind of a dedicated space
-where the piano can go for Lily to play. -Yes, that would be great.
Okay, I feel like we're missing out that
we're sitting in a music room and no one is playing music.
-You have your bass? -[Drew] Now?
-I have my bass, let me grab it. -Grab it.
-Oh, wow, no joke. -Look at this.
-Do you wanna show us a little something? -[Brian] Sure.
-[Jonathan] That is beautiful. -Whoo!
-I have two things to say. -[Brian] Yes, please.
-One, that was awesome. -Thanks.
And two, you have bass space.
-Oh. -You do.
-[Brian] Yeah. -You're, like, all smiles and giggles and then
bom, bom, bom, bom, bom, straight into it.
[producer] What do you think you'd look like when you're just playing the bass?
I'm scared to even try to make bass face.
It's probably something like this.
But that's not it at all, I'm sure.
-[Jonathan] Let's go look at that view. -[Brian] Yeah.
[Jonathan] This is so gorgeous out here.
It all makes sense now.
-Because this is the dream. -[Brian] Yeah.
-Yes. -[Jonathan] It's time to make the dreams come true inside.
What is your budget to do the work you wanna do?
I think we were hoping to stay, uh, within 190,000.
[Jonathan] Okay, that's good. But there is structural work.
'Cause as soon as we start doing structural, that can eat
up the budget really, really fast.
And I don't know that... Even 200,000 might not be enough so,
I'm assuming from what you've showed us, it's this main floor that is the target.
Yeah, absolutely.
We're excited, we're excited to love the indoor space
as much as we love the outdoor space.
[Drew] Okay, so you like Spanish style and you're more into craftsman.
Anything else?
Little pops of color here and there, you know, stretching outside of the greyish
zone would be great.
-[Drew] All right. -[Jonathan] Okay, cool.
I'll put together a couple ideas.
I'll still show you some different configurations
and you can tell me what you think you like the best.
And then, we're gonna jump in and do demo right away.
-Fantastic. -[Jonathan] Awesome.
Yeah, and I'm gonna take for a little inspiration tour if you're game as well.
-Yeah, yeah, absolutely. -Absolutely.
In the meantime, consider putting some of the budget
-toward a zipline. I think that would be really fun. -[Drew] Yes, I would ride it.
-I would. -[Brian] All right.
[Jonathan] Before we commit to any big changes,
first we need to see what's behind the walls
and get rid of that stuff that we know has to go.
-All right, there you go. -[Brian] Let's do this.
Most importantly, we gotta get rid of the weird wall in the middle.
Who wants to use the reciprocating saw on this wall?
Definitely me.
You got that? All right!
All right, let's do this!
[saw whirring]
-Lily with a saw terrified me a little. -Yep.
Watching my wife do some demo was pretty exciting.
She did good.
Three! Two! One!
-Whoo! -Yeah!
[Lily] Thank goodness it's gone.
That was so exciting to just see it not obstructing our view from the kitchen area.
-[Brian] That's beautiful. -[Lily] Yes.
-It does make this post even more annoying. -Yeah.
[Jonathan] Well, I'm really hoping we can take it out.
But let's take a peek here. We wanna see, what is this holding up.
We don't know where our ceiling joists go.
So...
Huh.
It seems that there is a beam going from the exterior wall all the way over here.
But then this post comes up and appears to be supporting
the load of the flooring joints this way.
I'm gonna have the engineer come and take a look in person.
Worst case scenario,
if we have to keep this, I'll find a way to integrate it,
-so it just feels purposeful. -[both] Okay.
So focus on the good.
-Yeah. -[Jonathan] Wall down.
-And now let's focus on the cabinets. -[Brian] Excellent.
[Jonathan] I wish we could recycle these countertops,
but they're just too thin to remove without breaking.
All right.
Now, we wanna find the weak spot.
-[Brian] I think you found it. -There's the weak spot.
[Jonathan] And that's why we can't donate these cabinets.
Two. Three.
Nice.
[laughs]
This peninsula was just such an eyesore, and it was always in the way.
Not usable, really, for prep space.
So, this just feels so much more open.
We wanna make sure this kitchen works like a dream for you guys.
-That would be awesome. -[Lily] Yeah.
That's the goal.
-Should we keep going? -Let's break some stuff.
[Jonathan laughs] Yeah.
These kitchen cabinets are all custom made but with really cheap material.
And honestly, the only reason they kept the kitchen like this
is 'cause they had to have the extra bedroom.
Brian and Lily don't need the extra bedroom. They need a bigger kitchen.
So, we need to know what's going on behind this wall.
Is this shear rated? Does it have plywood across it?
Because if this is a shear wall, it's gonna affect what we can do here.
Because the extra support is needed for meeting codes to withstand earthquakes.
Also, inside the closet, I want to know exactly, what this post is?
What it's supporting?
That didn't take long.
That's not a load.
-It's a waste pipe for upstairs. -[Lily] Oh.
So, yeah, you can see.
I was thinking in my head, we're just gonna be dealing with structure.
And now we're dealing with a main stack and structure.
It's a waste stack. It's kind of a crappy find.
Wah! Wah!
[chuckling]
Uh, we still have to figure out our structure situation here,
which is still a mystery.
I think I'm gonna have to actually strip back
a lot of this, so that the engineer can look.
But in reality, we also have to figure out if we're dealing with a shear wall, over here.
Did you get a hole busted on the other side?
[Brian] Not yet, but I can.
Get busting.
And then we can try from this side too.
Watch your face.
Oh, my gosh.
I have no idea what the framer was doing when he was working here.
What were they framing for? I do not...
And it's not even a shear wall so that's good news.
-[Lily] Okay, great. -[Brian] Awesome.
[Jonathan] But there's another fricking stack.
What is going on here?
-[Lily] Oh, wow. -Why are there two stacks side by side?
How many bathrooms are there upstairs?
-[Lily] There are two. -All right.
So, I have more questions now that we've opened up the wall than I did before.
What the heck?
I have more questions now that we've opened up the wall than I did before.
It is a good thing that there's no shear layer here. That's great.
We could potentially lose the post in the middle of the living room.
And then, the plumber will have to figure out,
can we bring over the other stack, get that out of the way.
A lot of questions.
We were very surprised to find as many unforeseen issues in the walls as we did.
We hope that that's not going to completely take us over our intended budget.
I'll take some pictures, send it to the engineer, we'll get going,
but you guys can call it a day.
They bought a house that isn't inherently Spanish or craftsman
But Brian and Lily like some elements of those styles.
So I need to gauge just how much they actually want.
We'll see if we can marry the two.
-Pressure's on, Drew. -Yes.
[Drew] Come on.
[Brian] Oh, wow.
[Lily] I see a big kitchen.
-Ooh. -Mmm-hmm.
-[Lily] Oh, wow. -[Brian] Oh, my gosh.
[Drew] So, what's your first impression when you see
this beautiful kitchen space and all the cabinets?
I just love how open it is, how everything's accessible.
Lots of multi-functional dining areas too.
So it could be a little more casual as we want it.
You know, workspaces.
The one thing I like here that they have is there's no half wall from the living space
-into the kitchen area. -[Brian] Yep.
[Drew] It's way more connected between the two.
The layout of your house is a lot wider footprint.
-Yup. -So, you can get away with having the table
-separate from the kitchen area. -Yeah.
Color wise, is this a color you would wanna choose?
I like the idea of two-tone cabinets.
Maybe different uppers and lowers.
And, um, in terms of color, I think we both really like blues.
But if you really wanna amp that up on the design side
let's also do two-tone countertops. You up for that?
-All right, yeah, that sounds great. -Yeah, yeah, that sounds cool.
Wow, two-tone countertops, that's so out of your normal...
It's a little more bold than I would normally go.
And it's far, far away from the, kind of, the builder
grade cookie-cutter design that we have.
Give me a second here.
I'm, kind of, like a proud father. You're growing up.
Little design Brian is growing up.
[Lily] You have changed him as a man.
You're becoming a two-tone kind of guy
Two-tone countertops.
You know, we all have to step out of our comfort zone
at some point. I'm trying here. I'm trying.
Single tear. I'm proud of you.
I did that in our kitchen and Linda loves it.
-It's just really nice to make it your own. -[Brian] Cool.
And also when you have friends and family over, you can walk around, be like,
"Oh, welcome to my kitchen." 'Cause you're so fancy now.
You have to talk like you're fancy.
-We're gonna have to work on that. -[Jonathan and Lily] Yeah.
Anyway, back to reality.
Uh, when we're looking at the hardware and the faucet,
what do you think?
I think we'd prefer either black or something that blends
-in a little bit more. -[Brian] Yeah.
Anything else jumps out to you?
I like that it's very natural wood
-and, you know, the floors... -[Drew] Yeah.
...are very natural looking.
Yeah, I think we'd love maybe a wider plank floor and kind of a medium tone.
This is pretty close. We would even maybe go a hair lighter than this, I think.
Yeah, and actually what I like too is there's a lot of variation in the board
and something like these wooden shelves,
we can hit that craftsman's style you like.
-[Brian] Exactly. -[Drew] Anything else before we head to the living room?
-[Brian] No, let's head there. -[Lily] I think you covered...
[Brian] Oh, Lily, look at this.
[Lily] Oh, my gosh, that is so cute.
[Drew] I love a niche like that. It's perfect for pet owners.
So, if you want something like that I'll tell Jonathan
to make sure to build something in for Moose.
-[Brian] Yeah, I think that'd be amazing for Moose. -[Lily] Yeah.
He can eat while we're eating.
-Yeah. -[Drew] Exactly.
Moose is the best name for a dog by the way.
Come on in here, make yourselves at home.
I feel that you need to transform that living space.
Because right now, it just feels a little barren to me.
-Yeah. -Yes, it absolutely does.
But it's fine. I mean, it's good.
Now we're figuring out a way to style your home that fits both your aesthetics.
So, it's gonna be perfect in the end.
[Lily] Yeah, and I like all the pops of color here, nice art.
[Drew] You have a fireplace, they obviously don't have that here.
Do you see built-ins at all on that wall?
Would you want to see additional built-ins?
Or do you just wanna focus on the fireplace feature.
I think the fireplace feature, uh, is really important to us.
I feel that this is where we could bring in a bit of that Spanish influence,
by swapping out the surround with some really unique tiles.
-Sounds great. -Yeah, that sounds amazing.
[Lily] It's great that they have a bar right there.
You know, that'll be great for entertaining.
It's also separate from the kitchen space.
What we could actually do is instead of just having a bar cart,
if you do, like, built-ins but we might not necessarily do that in the living room.
Maybe we can just do some built-ins or a small area
that's like a bar area built-in.
-Yeah, yeah. -That'd be fantastic.
-That sounds very cool. Yeah. -If we have the space for it.
That's the trick. Once we know more there,
we can really come up with the options for you.
I think it's given us a lot to think about and I think it's made us really excited
about seeing the design when it's all done.
-[Drew] All right, thanks, guys. -All right.
[Drew] I don't think Brian and Lily are that far apart from each other.
We don't need to go full Spanish style with this home.
And we also don't need to do a fully craftsman home either.
So, we're good.
[Jonathan] I found a bunch of complicated stuff
with Brian and Lily during demolition.
Well, now with Gus I'm continuing the demo, stripping everything back,
and every stud cavity we open shows us another problem.
I don't understand why there is so much plumbing in these walls.
There's definitely some challenging structural stuff going on.
The more we open up, the more confusing it gets.
This is actually becoming comical now because we have
one, two, three, four, five, five pipes, two of those are stacks.
Every design for the kitchen and how we wanna expand it
in my mind has this all completely opened.
-It's crazy. -This is, uh, disappointing.
[Drew] We found so many structural issues that we need
to fully open up all the walls to see what else we're dealing with.
Brian and Lily's house is located on a hill in an earthquake zone.
So it's imperative an engineer investigates the mysterious
support post to discuss options for removing it.
As well as the load-bearing pipe-filled kitchen wall.
But just when we think we found a solution
we discover even more serious structural concerns.
It'll be very costly fixing those problems and rerouting
all the plumbing and utilities.
This has escalated very quickly
and I have a terrible feeling about what this
is gonna mean financially for Brian and Lily.
The engineer, unfortunately came across news that means
if we want to give them everything they want, it's gonna be more.
Yeah, well, they gave us their max budget and then the house gave us its max problems.
Enter your home if you recognize it.
-[Brian] Whoa. -[Lily] Wow. All right.
[Jonathan] A little further opened up since you saw it.
-[Lily] Yes, yeah. -[Brian] A little bit, yeah.
[Jonathan] This is a big issue over here.
When we were doing demolition we discovered a couple
plumbing lines in the walls when we were opening things up.
And then, every stud cabinet we kept opening, another, another, another,
to the point where there's five plumbing lines in here. Two of them main stacks.
Very hard to move.
So, that's challenging when it comes to how we wanna change the footprint.
Also dealing with all the structure here, the post in the middle,
you can see why I was sweating
-a little bit with what we were gonna do. Yeah. -[Lily] Yeah.
[Drew] I mean, the tough thing is, I mean,
-aside from the structure over here with the pole... -[Brian] Sure.
...all of this makes for a lot more expensive decisions just to open up this wall.
Right.
I'm not gonna lie, the engineer said there was some very poor work done
in how this had been renovated in the past, structurally.
-Of all the things you wanna cheap out on, not structure. -No.
[Jonathan] Especially when you have structure of a house that is on a hill.
-[Lily] Right. -[Brian] Yeah.
The unfortunate thing is, the engineer said, "No matter what,
this has to be swapped out to a steel beam and it needs
to be almost four times the size."
-Oh, wow. -[Jonathan] This is way underrated.
Because you're on a hill
-and because the earthquakes and everything else. -[Lily and Brian] Okay.
The thing that, kind of, freaks me out a little bit too,
like this right now is holding up an incredible amount of weight.
-The upper level, the roof structure and everything. -Right.
-It's not even tied in to anything. -[Lily] Oh, my gosh.
This right now is holding up an incredible amount of weight
-for the upper level, the roof structure and everything. -Right.
-[Jonathan] It's not even tied in to anything. -[Lily] Oh, my gosh. Yeah.
-You can see it moving. -[Jonathan] It's literally just sitting
on this bottom plate that was here.
And we wanna make sure that everything is safe.
Yeah.
It's pretty shocking to watch Jonathan kicking that post.
To think that our bedroom is right above that
and that little 4x4 post
is what's holding up the upper level is pretty scary.
We're also really glad that they're gonna get in there
and get it structurally sound
and, you know, we can rest easy at night
knowing that the house is in good shape.
Do you want the financially positive option first?
Or the financially negative option first?
Which one is the option that'll get us
the open kitchen with the island?
-[both] Okay. -Well, I'll give that to you first then.
[Brian and Lily] Okay.
Option one, and we don't normally do this
'cause I know your max budget is $190,000.
-Yeah. -[Lily] Mmm-hmm.
The only way we can open this up,
the beam work that would be involved,
moving this plumbing.
Everything that would have to happen
would be $200,000.
[Drew] And it would take seven weeks to complete.
-[both] Okay. -[Drew] Imagine with that pipe-filled bedroom wall gone,
just how much space would be created.
That would give you a complete open concept over here,
so we could have a massive long island,
extend your kitchen all the way across.
It would be incredible.
We'd have a dining area here in the center
with a built-in bar over here that would help hide this post,
and beautiful matching flooring throughout the whole main floor.
[Jonathan] And on top of that, we would completely update your living room,
relocate your piano,
and make it warm and welcoming,
blending some very subtle Spanish design influences,
and wide plank flooring to touch on that craftsman natural wood look.
And probably the most functional layout you could possibly get.
-[Lily] Yep. -Okay.
I do like that we're gonna be sure that it's safe
and really structurally sound.
But, yeah, it's a lot more money than we were looking at originally.
[Jonathan] Don't let it stress you out until you hear option two
'cause option two still gives you an incredible layout,
and $20,000 still in your pocket.
-We like that. -Yeah.
-[all laugh] -Option two would come in at $180,000.
-[Brian] Okay. -It would only take six weeks to complete.
-[Brian] Okay. -With option two, we would keep this wall here,
where it currently is.
So we don't have to move all of this plumbing.
It simplifies a lot of the structure,
'cause we wouldn't have to put in the same beam in everything.
-[Brian] Okay. -[Jonathan] However,
we would extend your kitchen out this way a little bit
with an island that comes into this space.
The only difference is we'd change the design
so that you don't have it completely open.
You're going to have a wall.
So we would relocate your dining room
into the space at the back over here.
So it feels like the flow is a lot better through these two spaces...
-[Brian] Okay. -...and keep that continuity
-with the hardwood throughout. -[Lily] Mmm.
[Jonathan] You'd still get that great bar over here.
We'd redo the living room, fireplace.
Everything would be gorgeous.
Everything would be exactly the same.
-Okay. -Saves you two weeks and $20,000.
And it's still gonna have all the bells and whistles that you guys want.
I don't like presenting options
that are over our clients' max budgets
because that's the point of a max budget.
-You kind of figure out a solution within that. -Yeah.
I just really know how much they want the open concept,
so I want them to understand what that would cost.
My gosh.
What do you think it's gonna be, option one or option two?
[Brian sighs]
The older I've gotten, the more I've always thought,
if you're gonna do something, you should do it the right way.
I think if we're doing it, we should really do it.
-Yeah, I think we'll go with option one. Yep, yes. -Option one it is, yeah.
-[Drew] All right. -[Jonathan] Whoo!
-One year in, big financial decisions. -[Brian chuckling]
I know, I know, yeah.
All right then, I'll talk to you in a couple of days
and get out. The next time
-you see this place, it'll be done. -Oh, good.
-[both] All right. -[Jonathan] All right, thanks, guys.
[Brian] At this point, I think we're pretty much
-tapped out on funds. -Yeah.
So we're going to keep our fingers and toes cross
and hope that this is the end of the unexpected things that they find.
[Drew] No turning back now.
First order of business is prepping the temporary walls
that need to support the whole weight
of the second story of the house
while we perform some major surgery on the posts and beams.
[Jonathan] And the challenge is,
the structure the engineer is calling for
means that we're going to push a beam up into the ceiling.
No plumbing can go through there.
[Drew] So we also have an incredible amount of rerouting to do.
Water lines, drains, waste, HVAC.
Not to mention, all the electrical.
[Jonathan] We're gonna be putting in a new post to carry all of the load.
Massive beams, massive posts. It's a huge undertaking.
But so worth it to make sure Brian and Lily's home
is finally safe and secure forever.
[Jonathan] With the house now properly supported,
we can all breathe a sigh of relief,
and focus on the less stressful design finishes.
[Drew] We're freshening up the fireplace, and if we're careful,
we can save them some money on the design.
-It's in here pretty solid. -[Jonathan] Yeah.
We do not want to damage... I don't think we actually need to take the surround off.
We just need to take this trim off,
pop the stone out.
We're keeping the fireplace and keeping the mantel.
Then we'll add a Spanish-inspired tile to make it pop.
There is no money to replace all of this.
All of the money is going into the kitchen and the structure.
[Drew] We have a good idea of what we want from the inspiration tour,
so we just need to fine-tune our choices.
We can totally take this house away from that builder basic grays
and make this a very personalized aesthetic that speaks to them.
We should talk tile
because Lily wants something that is sort of a Spanish influence,
so a little bit of color or pattern.
That could be in the kitchen, it could be around the fireplace.
-[Drew] So, something like this. -[Drew] Something subtle.
They just want something that's nice but not too busy.
-[Jonathan] So that's for the fireplace surround. -[Drew] Yeah.
-Something like that. -[Drew] And then,
we can kind of play with how you build the pattern on it.
It's not like they want a Spanish look through the entire house,
so having something like the fireplace with that is great.
But what do you think about where the range is or for the backsplash?
We can keep that a little more classic.
If we went maybe a little more like mosaic...
-[Drew] Mmm-hmm. -Do this guy.
-[Drew] Mmm-hmm, okay. -[Jonathan] It's a little...
Either that or we do something more like that
that's just a clean, sort of square mosaic.
I mean, I do like kind of those warmer tones throughout.
[Drew] That's nice, except for
it depends on the color we go for with the cabinets.
They wanted white uppers and blue lowers, so let's pick the shade.
[Jonathan] Mmm. I like this light blue.
We could do that on the island and on the bar.
That's the nice thing, you have this beautiful tile hood backsplash
over in the bar area having the pop of color with wallpaper.
Now you're creating these zones of interest.
[Drew] Yes, color and interest. No more boring cookie-cutter.
[Jonathan] Oh, that's not bad.
[Drew] More of a watercolor kind of a look.
-I like that. -[Jonathan] Boom, yes, we have that. Oh, good.
Do we have everything? Maybe some fabrics?
What do you think?
I like the idea of introducing, like, camel colors and, like,
just something a little bit richer.
We could do on the chairs...
Maybe the darker.
-[Jonathan] This one here? -[Drew] Yeah.
All right.
Something warm and woodsy to hit that craftsman note Brian likes.
And then maybe,
if we are looking at, like, a built-in banquette, we could do...
I think we keep it in the blue realm.
Again, some color to liven up those wood tones.
-What do you prefer? -[Drew] Mmm...
-Just throw them both on there. -[Jonathan] Figure out.
-[Drew grunts] That's it. -[Jonathan] All right.
I think the kitchen is gonna be the key component.
Especially now that we've gotten rid of that half-wall hurdle,
and everything will be changing.
We've given their cookie-cutter home
-a little bit of personality. -A little person... A lot of personality.
[Jonathan] With all of our design and structural changes behind us,
we can move ahead cautiously.
The new increased budget means we need to be more cost-conscious.
But we still don't wanna compromise too much on style and function.
New energy-efficient windows will look great
and help them save money in the long-term.
Reducing the size of the old patio doors in the former bedroom
will allow for far more function
with extended cabinets and countertop space.
[in Austrian accent] Ugh, Drew so strong.
I put this in front of you and then win lifting contest.
[Jonathan] Can you pull the, the bottom toward you just a tiny bit?
[in normal voice] The top?
[Jonathan] The bottom.
-[Drew chuckles] -Why do you mess with me?
It's just so easy sometimes.
You know why I'm Mom's favorite?
I'm less annoying.
You can let go.
I can go home? Awesome, thank you.
-[drilling] -Sometimes things are just easier without Drew anyway.
One thing I don't need Drew's help with is the new dog door for Moose.
He's a big part of Brian and Lily's family,
and he needs better function in this house
so he can come and go as he pleases.
[howling]
[Jonathan] With the new support beam and post now successfully installed,
we can take down the temporary walls.
I keep thinking I've seen it all,
[chuckling] but then, it was a bit of a shock
to find all the hidden plumbing
and knowing that the undersized tiny post
was the main thing holding up the second story.
We had to go $10K over their max budget to fix these issues,
and it caused me some serious design headaches.
But I can now rest easy knowing that the house is safe and secure,
and we can continue with all the major rerouting of utilities,
and get started on the insulation.
When we found out the enormous post had to stay,
I was worried because it would stand out like a giant elephant in the room.
But this design challenge actually kind of worked in our favor.
I integrated the post into the new bar area.
You would never know it was there.
And now the space has a lot more perks to offer than just cold drinks.
This actually turned out beautifully.
Bigger pantry, bar area built in,
everything's tucked back as tight as possible,
and it gave us even more storage
-which is a benefit. -[Gus] Yes, yeah.
And once we get the drywall on there,
-it'll give you a sense of style too. -[Gus] Yeah.
[Jonathan] Okay, let's bring in some flooring.
Newlyweds Brian and Lily wanted to start their new life together
renovating their forever home.
But their house is a long way from experiencing marital bliss.
With the structure repaired and the utilities installed,
we can now start closing up the walls and putting down the flooring.
I want everything to be perfect
and that even includes the direction of the boards.
Whoa, Gus junior.
-[Gus chuckling] Yes. -[Jonathan] It's Dillan, right?
-[Jonathan] Dillan, all right. Good to meet you. -[Gus] Yeah.
Okay, so we've got the luxury vinyl.
They want that durability, the wearability.
But we also have a decision to make as far as direction.
So, it always looks slightly less attractive
when all of your boards terminate
-into a doorway. -Into a door.
If we go this way, all of our doors
-will have a nice clean aesthetic there. -[Gus] Okay.
Sometimes, it's nicer for the fireplace feature or an island
just to go along with it.
-So you want the clean edge on the fireplace. -[Gus] Yeah.
-And the island. -[Gus] And the island.
-No we have a-- -And I'm saying front door and back door.
-[Gus] Yes. -Okay.
-We have a third party here that can decide. -[Jonathan] Yeah, hold on.
-There's no right or wrong. -Yeah.
[Jonathan] You go with what makes the most sense.
So what do you think?
-Um, you are my father. -Thank you.
-Thanks. -But I'm gonna go with Jonathan.
-[cheering] Yeah! It actually worked in my favor. -Betrayal!
[Jonathan] Do I have to pay you off or anything like that?
-No need. -[Jonathan] Okay, cool.
Well, I'll grab more boxes but now we know which way we're going.
-Okay. -[all laughing]
[chuckling] While Dillan patches up his father's wounded design pride,
we're busy patching up the rest of the walls
that we had to open up to reroute the utilities.
With the direction decided,
we can now put in all our luxury vinyl wood-look flooring
to give it a consistent look throughout the whole main floor.
The old kitchen was so tiny and closed off.
But with everything open,
we now have so much wall space to fill with cabinets and counters.
Having more style and function was our priority,
and this built-in bar area is a perfect example of that.
Can you believe that we hide a big post over there?
-Yeah, I don't know what you're talking about. -[Jonathan] Where? What post?
-There's no post. -[laughing] No, there's no post.
Stop making stuff up. Nobody... It's our secret.
Oh, there you go.
You literally think that this has always been here, looking at this.
-Yeah. -[Jonathan] Yeah.
Well, you have an extra pantry, closet, we hid the post.
This is purposeful.
They love to entertain, so...
Everything about this house,
the better use of this space for the kitchen,
it just speaks to what they want.
It's gonna be fun actually 'cause
we'll set this up, we'll dress it so it's beautiful,
but this will be like the celebration hub.
-Oh, of course. -[Drew] Oh, yeah.
[Jonathan] Especially when we add a pop of color
with the wallpaper on the back.
I feel like adding these little custom touches
is what makes the space feel special.
It makes it feel like a fully custom home and it's gonna look gorgeous.
[Jonathan] Another area we can add some flair
to reflect Brian and Lily's unique and artistic personalities
is their fireplace.
We wanted to keep the existing mantel,
but remove the dated stone surround
so we can give it a little more personality.
By putting something in like this tile,
I think it kind of bridges the gap between the two, pays an homage to both,
but blends it seamlessly together so they both get what they want.
Yeah, this is a Spanishly crafty design.
[Jonathan] And we saved money keeping their perfectly good mantel.
-[Drew] Looking good. -[Jonathan] Uh-huh.
I'm telling you, when this is done,
it's gonna be a thing of art.
I think Brian and Lily are getting everything they want
to make this their forever home,
but are we doing enough for Moose?
[Jonathan] Uh, Moose has his very own VIP doggy door.
[Jonathan howling]
[Drew] And you said that they liked
the little puppy station at the inspiration tour.
Moose is getting his very own eat-in puppy cubby.
Right, but what about, like, a doggy zipline
that goes, you know, from the back deck all the way down
-to the park? -That's a terrible idea.
[Drew] We had a lot of issues with the structure of the house.
And it's not about to let me off easy.
In the former bedroom,
we reduced the double patio doors to a single door
to make more room for kitchen cabinets.
We had to amend our building permit
and that's now holding up our final approval.
Oh, you might not have realized this,
I think you, uh, missed a spot with the drywall.
[Jonathan] I, uh, I missed you!
So we've had final on almost everything, except this.
We have to wait.
I understand if you're changing something
as in you're doing new things you hadn't done before,
but when it's just taking the door down from a slider to a, a single swing,
I didn't think you would have to do that.
But here, because we were changing the size of it,
even though we're using the same structure,
they still said they want that so...
[Drew] I know what it is.
I called the city and said, "Guys, Jonathan loves extra steps.
Can we give him an extra step somewhere just to really make sure he's enjoying
-this process?" -I'm gonna need extra therapy.
So the house will be done
-except for this wall. -Except this.
[Jonathan] The interesting thing though is
the city said that anything that affects the exterior
is gonna require a permit here.
Yet they didn't ask for a permit when it comes to the puppy door.
Shh. Don't bring it up.
Shh. [whooshes]
[Jonathan] Good news.
The city finally approved the permit for the new kitchen door,
so we can close up the walls around it.
And begin the very busy push to the end of the reno.
All the final finishes are going into the kitchen
including tiling inside of Moose's dog dish nook,
and trimming out all the focal points.
Lily likes the pop of color she sees in Spanish style designs.
So we're adding that with some contrasting blue and white cabinets
and two-toned countertops.
Black around the perimeter cabinets and white for the island.
All surrounded by new stainless steel appliances.
[Drew] We want Brian and Lily's home to feel fun and contemporary,
and reflect their cool and creative personalities.
[Jonathan] They're young newlyweds and they both love music.
So we want them to walk in and feel inspired.
-[Drew] All righty, this is probably the last of-- -I have good news.
-[Drew] Hmm? -[Jonathan] We actually have a finished space over here.
[chuckling] I thought we would get
to finishing touches and then, all of a sudden, still have an open wall.
Some things keep me up at night,
and this not being finished definitely did.
[Jonathan] Look how cute Moose is.
-[Drew] Gotta have our pup pics. -[Jonathan] Yeah, so good.
Muah.
[Drew] Okay.
How you feeling about the space?
I think everything is officially here.
This house that had no real character
perfectly fits things that are important to them like the piano.
This place feels like a nice big warm hug.
And even just the fireplace surround being changed,
feels so much more elegant now.
-Do you love it? -Hey, wait.
[whooshes]
-[Drew grunts] -Your timing's always off.
[whooshing]
Ha, ha! There we go. Let's go get Brian and Lily.
[in sing-song voice] I cannot wait to see.
Yeah, I'm so excited to see the kitchen.
-That kitchen was so small. -[Lily] Yep.
[Brian] I'm sure this is gonna be amazing.
[Drew] Yeah. Couple things have changed.
[Brian] Oh, I love it. I'm so excited.
-[Brian chuckling] -[Lily] Oh, my gosh.
Whoa!
-[Brian chuckling] Oh. -[Lily laughing] Wow.
-You literally did the "oh". -[Brian laughing]
Stop it, this is amazing.
[Lily] Oh, my gosh.
Wow, look how open it is.
And wow, this is a true transformation.
[Brian] Oh, this is amazing.
You look like a kid on Christmas.
Santa was here?
-I just, I wanna know what you did with my house. -[laughing] Yeah.
-This is not our house, this is amazing. -Wow.
You guys picked an incredible home.
It was lacking some personality.
I mean, it's not a massive space.
But we were keeping the elements that were actually quite nice,
trying to dress it up with...
-We know you love that Spanish influence. -[Lily] Mmm-hmm.
[Drew] So giving you a little bit of that feel here.
-Getting rid of the half-wall... -[Brian] Yeah.
-[Lily] Yeah. -...and connecting the spaces.
It's unbelievable, I mean, it's just so open
compared to where it was before.
And it feels like all the space is usable.
And the crazy thing is it feels bigger here.
This is where we had to hide the massive post
-in order to open everything up. -[Lily] Mmm.
-[Brian] Okay. -We knew you loved the idea of a bar.
-[Lily] Look at this beautiful bar. -[Brian] Oh, my God.
-This bar is amazing. Look at this. -[Lily] Oh, my gosh.
-I love these countertops too. -Yeah, this is a really nice color.
[Brian] I love the open shelving
with the blue color matching the bottoms.
I think it looks incredible and that wallpaper is stunning.
It technically is the center of the home, the heart of the home,
so we want to make sure that it looks really great.
-This now feels so expansive. -[Brian and Lily] Yeah.
And so open.
So with this view, it's just such a more beautiful space to be in.
-[Jonathan] Even your floors are... -[Lily] I love it.
-...extremely durable. -[Lily] Yep.
-[Brian] I love it. -[Jonathan] Will last through
all the traffic that you throw at it.
Your guests will walk in and they'll be blown away as well
at the setup for your dinner parties.
[Lily] Yeah, they're not gonna believe what they're walking into.
-[Jonathan] Here, have a seat. -Have a seat.
-Enjoy your dining space. -Thank you.
[Jonathan] This is just the perfect spot for a great dining table.
You can still have your sight lines all through the entire space.
[Lily] Yep.
Before, I think Lily would agree,
there was no way we were ever gonna host family here.
-[Lily] Mmm-hmm. -[Brian] And we kinda had a dining room
and we sort of had a living room and now,
it's like, I don't know if I have enough friends
-to fill up this space. [laughing] -[Lily laughing]
[all laughing]
You cannot throw an incredible dinner party
unless you have an incredible kitchen like this.
-Oh, my goodness. -[Brian exclaims]
[Lily] Look how massive this is.
-Brian? -This looks amazing.
-Look at this! -[all laughing]
-[Lily] What is it? -[Drew] That's for Moose.
[Brian] That's amazing.
-Well, you said Moose is family. -[Brian] Yes.
So, you wanted this to be a spot for him too.
-[both] Yeah. -[Jonathan] One thing as well,
you wanna make sure he can go inside and out anytime he wants,
so, I love, he's got his own door.
-Built in fully. -[Lily] Oh, my gosh.
-Amazing. -So little stuff for Moose,
-little stuff for you guys. -[Brian] Yeah.
[Lily] Oh, the two tone blends in so nicely
-and this is huge. -[Brian] Yeah.
Could you imagine having an island like this before?
-[Brian chuckles] No. -[Lily] Basically impossible.
-[all laughing] -[Brian] I mean where we're standing right now,
-what was here before. -[Lily] Right.
-[Brian] This wall. -Every plumbing line
-in the city. -[Brian laughing]
[Jonathan] I could not believe how much was inside that wall.
[Brian] It's magically disappeared into the walls. It's incredible.
[Drew] Well, it did cost us a little bit more,
but sometimes it's worth spending a bit more
because at the end of the day, this is what you need.
-It was worth every penny. -Absolutely.
This is exactly how the flow and the layout of this
should have been all along, I think.
[Jonathan] Like just imagine how much easier it's gonna be to be able to cook in this.
[Lily] Absolutely.
-Oh, look how deep the sink is. -[Brian] Yes.
-So much better. -[Lily] Yeah.
It's so much storage here.
[Drew] You have a drawer style microwave.
Well, you even have a full coffee station
-over there. -[Lily] Oh, my gosh.
-[Brian] Oh, that's amazing. -[Lily] Oh, my gosh.
This is the largest fridge
they probably [chuckling] sell at the store here.
Oh, my goodness.
You also have a walk-in pantry right here
-with a whole bunch of extra shelving storage. -[Brian] Amazing.
You have storage galore.
You have prep space galore.
You have sight lines galore.
Well on top of all that though too, before, you had no seating.
-[Brian] None. -[Drew] It was so limited.
But now you have breakfast bar seating.
-You have a great entertainment space-- -No, seating galore.
-Seating galore, everything galore. -[all laughing]
[Drew] Yeah, the dining table's amazing.
Plus you have this casual breakfast nook over here which is pretty awesome.
It's galor-ious.
-[Jonathan] Yes, yes. -Ha, lovely.
[Lily] This is a space we'll be in every day.
And I just love that where we are right now,
there used to be a kitchen sink right there.
-[Jonathan] This was the kitchen which is crazy. -[Brian laughing]
We're currently in the entirety
-of what used to be our kitchen. -Yeah, it's pretty surreal.
This'll be such a great space for just breakfast in the morning
and having coffee
and even just working out of here is very comfortable.
And you have the sun coming in in the morning.
It's just a great little nook.
[Jonathan] And when you sit here and you look up
-at all these memories. -[Lily] Oh, my gosh.
[Brian chuckling] It's just amazing photos
-from so many different places we've been. -[Lily] Yes.
-And I love the photo of us at the wedding with Moose. -[Lily chuckling] Yeah.
-I think it's everything that we wanted and more. -Mmm-hmm.
It's amazing, it's amazing. This space is just incredible.
I think we celebrate.
It's just such a seamless design
and it's so intentional of every little pocket,
has been really thought out,
and it just turned out so beautiful.
We're gonna be able to really grow into the house over time,
start a family,
and, um, I think we're just really looking forward
to all the things that are gonna come in the future
living in this beautiful space.
Cheers to fond memories.
[Brian and Lily] Cheers.
[Lily] Thank you all so much.
-Moose, the dog, is gonna be very excited... -[laughs]
...when he comes through. I think he's gonna be a little confused originally.
But once he finds the treat bowl,
I think he's gonna be extremely excited.
-[Brian gasps] Yes. -[Lily] Yum.
[Brian] Special treats.