“House beyond recognition” debuted on the air in 2003 and for the next 9 years gathered millions of viewers, paving the way for the Polish version of this format as well. The formula assumed carrying out thorough renovations of the participants’ properties in just 7 days to make them more functional and adapted to current trends. However, it is known that television has its own rules, and what looked like a dream come true on the screen was actually far from it.
The backstage of “House Unrecognizable” is shocking. There weren’t really any volunteers on set?
To transform each house, the production employed professional construction teams who carefully implemented the assumptions previously prepared by the architects. However, every pair of hands was worth its weight in gold, and the participants’ neighbors eagerly appeared in the episodes, doing small jobs to improve the entire process. The portal cited several threads on Reddit, where volunteers revealed the real story behind the scenes.
It turned out that although some people actually decided to help of their own free will, some people were almost forced to do so by the companies where they were employed. Moreover, if the program coincided with their working hours, they had to take leave to participate in the shooting. Some also pointed out the lack of professionalism of the builders and the hasty execution of renovations at the expense of quality. It even happened that metamorphoses were carried out in winter, which meant that after a few months of use, the house required improvements that the participants were forced to cover from their own pockets.
Lack of professionalism and failure to verify participants. This is what the production of “House Unrecognizable” really looked like
One of the website’s participants recalled the situation during the renovation of a fire station and a high school that were destroyed during Hurricane Rita. Due to numerous shortcomings of the team, the buildings were excluded from use for the following months.
Half the sinks weren’t even plugged in, the light switches and plugs were just attached to the wall and didn’t work. (…) The fire alarm system did not work and the building itself did not meet fire safety requirements
– she described. However, this is not the end of the controversy. Typically, the houses of poor families were ultimately of such a high standard that the owners were unable to maintain them later, considering, among other things, to too high taxes or energy or water fees. For this reason, many of them were forced to sell their dream properties to avoid drowning in debt.
A year later, the family had to move out because they could not afford to pay his maintenance and taxes
– wrote an Internet user. Others also noted the creation of fashionable but impractical designs. Houses located in dangerous districts often did not have the necessary security measures, and there were many situations when thieves simply broke in right after the broadcast and took away the most valuable items. Moreover, it was also supposed to slightly verify the stories presented by the participants, and the episodes featured couples who had long been divorced, but pretended in front of the cameras that they were still happily married for their new home.
Source: Gazeta
Bruce is a talented author and journalist with a passion for entertainment . He currently works as a writer at the 247 News Agency, where he has established himself as a respected voice in the industry.
