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KEVIN McCLOUD ON GRAND DESIGNS LIVE

If you met a man who told you he was going to build his house in a week, you’d think he was a bit strange. If he then told you he was going to do it using revolutionary design techniques and materials, you’d probably conclude he was mad. And if he said he was going to do it all live on national TV, in the company of Janet Street-Porter, you’d begin to edge away casually, looking around you for help. But if you happened to be talking to Kevin McCloud, then you’d be hearing the truth.

After years of playing the role of critic of other people’s houses, McCloud is putting his reputation on the line in Grand Designs Live, a week of programmes on Channel 4 dedicated to architecture and design. As if he hadn’t taken on enough, he’ll also be leading the search for the Grand Designs Home of the Year, testing some building products in a uniquely extreme style, and controlling a veritable cornucopia of stars dropping in to the studio for a visit. Here, he seems to wonder if he’ll make it out alive…

Grand Designs Live is about to hit Channel 4 for a week. Amongst other things, after all these years of passing judgement on the efforts of others, you’re finally building your own house, and a nation can pass judgement on you.
[Laughs] Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s enough of that!

What’ve you got planned?
Well, it’ll all be done in a very controlled way, of course! I’m particularly worried that I won’t be in control of what’s shown at all, that’ll all be down to my producer. So there may be some selective editing.

Your getting your excuses in already, aren’t you?
Um… Yes.

What have you been doing by way of preparation?
I’ve been doing press-ups, practicing hammering, that sort of thing.

And the whole thing’s got to be done in a week?
Yeah, it has. Six days, actually. We’ll obviously not be putting in ground services and digging foundations - we’re building on an existing platform, which helps. We’re building a house which is prefabricated, but it won’t have been put together before, and it doesn’t come from a kit factory either. We’re building it using two different systems. One for the ground floor and one for the first. The ground floor is a big, heavy, modular system, using recycled materials, and the first floor is a more lightweight timber structure. But both are very hi-tech.

So it’ll be an ultra-modern house?
Well, the materials are traditional, but they’re being re-worked to be much more user-friendly. I wanted to be environmental, but I didn’t want to build a house out of mud or stone or clay that was going to be so primitive and traditional that people wouldn’t want to use that system themselves. I want people to watch it and think “That is cool.” The house is one I’d be happy to have grace the screens in Grand Designs. It’s all part of the same ethos. It’s how we should be building our houses.

You’ve got an architect working towards your brief. What other help will you have?
The lovely thing is, we’ve got a big team, lots of enthusiastic researchers, 25-30-year-olds who are all eager to help. So they’ll be staying up all night hammering, obviously. And I’ll just turn up in the morning and ponce around. No, I shall be there all day, every day. Probably hammering too. I think there’s going to be a lot of hammering. I’ll be hammering my thumb! It may all go wrong, of course. The design is lovely, but I’ve just got to make sure I don’t cock it up in construction.

What will happen to the building when it’s finished?
It’s being built on a site outside ExCeL in East London. So we can’t leave it there. I think it’s going to go to the Building Research Establishment, and they’re going to prod it and poke it and see whether it really does stand up.

So the techniques and materials you’re using are sufficiently modern that it would be worth their while to investigate them?
Yeah, exactly. We’re going to rebuild it there, seal it, and offer it as an interesting constructional alternative.

There’s also a Grand Designs Home of the Year Competition featuring on TV. Can you elaborate on that?
Yeah. There are several different categories. This is really how the whole series came about. We wanted to take these awards that had been running for three or four years in the Grand Designs magazine and film it. Last year I presented the awards at an awards dinner, which was great, and the standard of the buildings was so high. These weren’t just homeowners trying their luck, they were proper pieces of architecture. I thought that they deserved something bigger, and so when Channel 4 suggested doing something for TV around the exhibition, I suggested doing something around the awards. So we’ve got five categories, with three short listed homes in each one. And we’ve got a great judging panel, including George Ferguson, President of the RIBA, the architect Will Allsopp, Ken Shuttleworth, who designed the Gherkin, and Wayne Hemingway. And we’ll be asking the viewers to vote for the ones they really love.

So how will these homes be introduced to the viewers?
We’ll have a short film on each, and then in the studio we’ll have people championing their favourites. So we’ll have people like Naomi Cleaver, George Clark and Janet Street-Porter trying to flog the idea that viewers should vote for that particular house - and I’ll be asking them why. That’s my job - to be a roving nuisance.

You’ve got a load of guest presenters involved too, haven’t you?
Yeah, I don’t want to get lonely! Janet Street-Porter, George Clark, Sarah Beeny, Naomi Cleaver, Kirstie Allsopp, Diarmuid Gavin, and Jason Bradbury.

Apart from anything else, that’s every star in the property firmament, isn’t it?
I suppose it is. But I didn’t want it to be just that, hence Janet, who brings a bit more roughage, and Jason, who is so good, and so funny. He used to be a stand-up comedian. Speaking of which, we’ve also got Dave Gorman involved. We sent him packing, to go off and make some films about American houses. Insane American houses. Not just big, bad taste mansions, but really unusual, quirky, oddball stuff. He’s made these very funny films, so I’m really looking forward to having him involved. And Bill Bailey is probably going to pop in as well. I’m quite keen that we don’t take ourselves too seriously.

You’re also doing something called Extreme Consumer Testing. What’s that?
Well, it’s more like destructive product testing, where you take something like a big piece of glass and drive a digger over it to see how strong it is.

So you basically get to be a destructive little boy?
Er… Yes. Do you know, the funny thing is, I was on a big commercial building site recently, and we had the biggest crane in the country there. They had to strengthen the road to bring it in, and they had to use another crane to put this enormous crane together. It’s a crane which is so expensive and so computerised that if the driver overstrains it, or leans too far, not only does it flash lights and warns you with alarms going off, it sends an email to the manufacturers. Anyway, the funny thing is, 200 men from big construction and engineering firms from all hanging around in hard hats and site boots, every one of them getting excited about the size of the crane - like five-year-old boys.

A lot of this is about celebrating the best of British design. Do you think there is a specific British style of design?
I think that right now, in construction around the world, there is a British culture of design and engineering. I think we are still the best in the world. If you go to China, and look at every major project happening there, a phenomenal number of British architects are involved. Every country has its own traditions - Japan has a very strong architectural tradition, so does America, and France too. But I think that right now, the most diverse, interesting, inventive and imaginative direction is coming from Britain.

Do you think Grand Designs works so well because so many British people are prepared to take risks with their projects?
Yeah. I think the general view is that we’re a fairly conservative nation. And yet if you look at the history of engineering in Britain, it’s defined by the expression ‘Work in Progress’. I think we have a fantastic tradition of risk-taking. It’s British eccentricity at its best - people going out on a limb because they’re passionate about something. I love that aspect of our country - it’s the antithesis if dullness. Some of the projects we’ve filmed are just crazy, stuff that’s brand new and unique.

On a practical level, this is going to be you live on primetime TV every day for a week. What’s that going to be like?
I’ll tell you when it’s all over. I don’t know what it’ll be like. I’m planning on not drinking very much alcohol that week. I’ll be trying to get to bed early. We’ll be building this house, we’ve got about 15 film crews working around the clock, it’s a huge enterprise. We’ve got all these films to put together, all these guests, a live studio audience. And it’s all got to come together in a very short period of time and be broadcast every evening. Of course things are going to go wrong. But I’ve done a bit of live telly, and I really enjoy the buzz. The problem is, how do you get rid of the adrenaline at the end of every day? What I will not be doing is going out to clubs. You won’t see me being photographed falling out of them at 3am, with a bimbo on each arm. I think I’ll be going back to my hotel and dying slowly. It’s going to be a mad week, and we’re not going to get much sleep, but it’ll be worth it.

Grand Designs Live begins on Channel Four on Sunday 4th May at 8:05pm, and is on daily at 5pm and 9pm throughout the week.

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