Image: The Block/Channel 9
Something’s missing from The Block this season. There are no black baths or bad neon styling. Left-of-centre ideas and risk-taking cease to exist. Any originality whatsoever has left the chat. The room reveals at Mount Eliza are, dare I say it, beige in five different fonts.
It’s almost making me pine for the amber resin bath that Han and Can installed last year. I’m dying for a rebellious contestant to do something – anything – that laughs in the face of quiet luxury.
Please, for the love of Marty’s moustache, bring back bold ideas like the controversial circus stripes in Courtney and Grant’s shower in Season 20.
Any sign of life – even a mere whisper of personality – wouldn’t go astray among the sea of neutrals we’re seeing revealed so far.
It’s not entirely the contestants’ fault, of course. They were briefed in week one to make the homes “white, light and bright” if they wanted them to sell.
A warning to heed, given the last of the Daylesford homes have only just sold. Yet surely that was in part down to exceedingly high reserves. Are the Mount Eliza buyers really this vanilla?
This week, even the judges thought the “quiet luxury” the teams delivered was more just quiet. “This is where minimalism can go completely wrong,” said Shaynna as she stepped into Chantel and Wyatt’s bathroom.
If we continue like this, we’ll all feel dead inside by the end of this season. That “coffin bedhead”, as viewers have christened it, in Sev and Courtney’s winning guest bedroom, will come in handy when we all suffer a beige overdose.
Regardless, the judges found a few things to compliment this week. We recap the reveals below, with a few notes on what we’d tweak (or take a hammer to).
Winners: Courtney and Sev
Their score: 25.5/30 🥇
Courtney and Sev came in first, winning the $250,000 E&S appliance prize. They finished with help from the Cursio brothers, borrowed from Chantel and Wyatt. Contestant Rosco also helped them out after he and Lisa gave up hope of finishing their own bathroom by the end of the week.
“The functionality of this is perfection,” said Shaynna. The judges said the girls “just get it”, praising the curved rendered wall and inset shaving cabinets with plenty of storage.
Details we love…
- Plenty of bench space
- Skylights for natural light
Details we’d change…
- Curtains so close to a wet zone is a recipe for mould
- A more interesting bath style – or more interesting everything?
Home Beautiful rating: ★★★
Second: Adam and Jolene
Their score: 24.5/30 🥈
Adam and Jolene came in second place with a bathroom they completed entirely on their own, without help from any of the other contestants – a sore point, seeing as Courtney and Sev won with a lot of extra help.
There were a few things that missed the mark, and Shaynna felt the room could have benefited from more natural light and a door to enclose the toilet. Darren loved the material palette, saying, “It’s travertine, it’s oak, it’s white. Tick, tick, tick.”
Details we love…
- Finger tiles for interest (we wouldn’t want to be tasked with keeping that grout clean though)
- Shower bench for shaving (although it’s still giving faux sauna)
Details we’d change…
- Enclose the toilet, for obvious reasons
- More contrast or colour of any sort
Home Beautiful rating: ★★★
Third: Chantel and Wyatt
Their score: 21.5/30 🥉
Chantel and Wyatt took the first day of bathroom week off, threatening to quit after the previous week’s reveals where a budgeting stuff-up left them looking like “idiots”, as Wyatt put it. Yet they powered ahead with the help of the Cursio brothers and were leading the way by the end of the week.
“Are the Cursios your secret weapon?” a producer asked them. “I don’t think they’re a secret, they’re just a weapon,” Wyatt responded. Despite the fast tiling, there were some glaring mistakes, such as shaving cabinets that jutted out awkwardly and doors that clashed at the entry.
Personally, I think this team should have won, but the judges called it stark and prison-like. “It feels like a room as soon as we leave we’re going to forget,” said Marty. Aesthetically, we think it’s relatively chic, if a bit boring.
Details we love…
- Warm wall colour
- Chic shower layout
Details we’d change…
- The floor tiles could be replaced with a gentle checkerboard pattern
- Build the shaving cabinets into the wall
Home Beautiful rating: ★★★★
Fourth: Rick and Tayla
Their score: 18.5/30
The father and daughter may not have finished but it was noted by the judges that they seemed to have found their feet a little more this week than the previous one. “They’re on a much better trajectory,” said Shaynna.
Some of the styling was a miss, but nothing that couldn’t be easily fixed. The striped towels weren’t Shaynna’s idea of quiet luxury, yet at least they had attempted some pattern. The same went for the feature wall behind the vanity. Although not necessarily to everyone’s taste, they get points for trying something exciting.
“If they keep making decisions like this, they will be memorable,” said Darren.
Details we love…
- Bold choices like stripes
- Feature wall which was at least an attempt at something exciting
Details we’d change…
- Can someone please do a darker timber colour?
- The spherical lighting selection
- The main tiles were vanilla
Home Beautiful rating: ★★
Last: Lisa and Rosco
Their score: 15.5/30
“This is devastating,” said Shaynna. “They haven’t laid a tile, they haven’t painted a ceiling.” Despite not even coming close to finishing, the judges said Lisa and Rosco’s bathroom had the “best layout” and noticed their smart changes to the doors at the entry.
Their material selections were also praised, including the vanity and hardware, even though they were not yet installed. Honestly though, finishing a bathroom in a week seems like a tall order, so props for effort. But will these two be able to keep up in the long run?
Details we love…
- Material selections have potential
- Door layout makes the most sense
Details we’d change…
- Completing the room, which is not easy to do in a week but that’s The Block for you.
Home Beautiful rating: ★
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