Forever Home BBC2
Not so long ago, two topics above all were taboo for the British. You never asked people about money, and you never mentioned sex. Anything else was fair game.
These days, sex and money are all anyone ever wants to talk about, particularly on TV. But many other ordinary and innocent topics have somehow become off-limits.
It is not done, for instance, to ask a young couple whether they intend having children. That isn’t just impolite, it’s weirdly illiberal, as if the very idea that a woman might want to be pregnant is rampant male chauvinism.
Presenter Helen Skelton, meeting 29-year-old Jess and her partner Colin, 33, was immediately eager to know the budget for their house renovation, on Forever Home (BBC2). But throughout the three-year rebuilding project, she didn’t once ask whether the pair intended having a family — nor why, since it was currently just the two of them, they wanted or needed a four-bedroom house.
Of course, they could have told her to mind her own business. But that’s a phrase you don’t hear nearly enough these days either.
The question of children was all the more pertinent because, bizarrely, both Colin and Jess had a historic family connection to the building, near Welshpool, close to the English border. Formerly a pair of semi-detached cottages, it had been home at different times to her grandfather, and also to his grandparents.
That’s quite a coincidence. It’s easy to see why the couple, who were living in London when they first met, felt an affinity to the place. But we don’t watch shows like this to be left guessing about buyers’ motives. The presenter’s job is to ask questions even if they seem intrusive, which is why Kirstie Allsopp has been so successful on Ch4’s Location, Location, Location for 25 years — she has no inhibitions. Helen Skelton lacks the brass neck.
Presenter Helen Skelton, meeting 29-year-old Jess and her partner Colin, 33 (pictured to the right), was immediately eager to know the budget for their house renovation, on Forever Home (BBC2). But throughout the three-year rebuilding project, she didn’t once ask whether the pair intended having a family
Property shows, as other Ch4 formats such as George Clarke’s Amazing Spaces (pictured) have proved, work best when they feature several projects. Rapid editing and plenty of soundbites hold our interest. This programme lacked all that
She told us at the outset that major renovations were her passion, because she’d tackled a similar rebuild at her own home. But apart from a handful of snapshots, we saw and heard nothing else about that either. Once again, we were left guessing.
It’s also difficult to know what co-presenter Patrick Bradley was meant to be doing. The architect from Northern Ireland is a chirpy, garrulous character, but Helen informed us he was on hand ‘to give creative design ideas at every stage of the build’.
This didn’t happen. Patrick suggested moving the garage doors from the front to the side of the property, but that was about it.
From start to finish, what with knocking down walls, ripping out fireplaces and building a glass-walled extension, the work took three years. Before we were halfway through, it felt as though Forever Home was going to drag on — well, for ever.
Property shows, as other Ch4 formats such as George Clarke’s Amazing Spaces have proved, work best when they feature several projects. Rapid editing and plenty of soundbites hold our interest. This programme lacked all that.
