1. How has your life changed after Design Star? Did you participate in any events or get a specific job because of the show?I started my own company [
Epic Spaces], specializing in dynamic interactive interiors, large landscapes where design and build all of the spaces. I also sell custom artwork on my on line site. I currently am doing a two room job in Beverly Hills that blows doors on the wave room I did on the show. It's a Huge space where a large mural on the wall appears to have entered the room, the twin boy's beds are bolted to the wall up in the air in the corners and they are on a raised platform. The river then flows into the room where I have lifelike large boulder pillows filling the river bed. A 12 foot cargo net connects the beds that goes over the river and the kids can then climb off onto a bridge that folds down for more seating, then lifts upside down for a four person rocking horse. Their desks are under the beds and the theme of the room is "Where the land meets the sea", the three colored carpet pattern appears as if the river flows out and into the rest of the house by going out of the entrance and bathroom doors. The raised platform is all green, the lower level is sand color while the river is a soft blue. The source of the river is from a real photograph I blew up of Avalanche Gorge, in Glacier National Park. The mural then blends those colors out and into the rest of the room then fades to a more oceanic theme, with old 1700's era photographs of sailors at sea with huge mythological squids attacking ships.
Then there is the girls room..WOW...she is lucky. Above her bed are huge angel wings that I custom made that are 8 feet across. Very heaven like white and light blue ambiance, with 3 dimensional art pieces all over the walls, a custom woman's "Lip" chair, three floor to ceiling mirrors, three color carpet pattern again that appear to be bubbles, a chandelier from France with blue crystal drops, mirrored end tables with custom lamps on either end and strategically placed "Pussy Cat Doll" pictures throughout the room, her favorite...for now.
Just really fun wild rooms, ...oh yeah I also co-starred in another Hgtv show called "Superscapes", where a friend I have worked with before, "Gary Gragg" and I built a huge skate boarding half pipe attached it to a three story tree house then sunk it twelve feet into the ground, because it is considered an "accessory structure" from the town of Lafyette, Ca. We also put in a 200 foot zip line, and I dug a trampoline flush into the ground, all for the owners 15 year old son who was doing flips off the tramp with me while he had a broken arm from a snowboarding accident the week before. His son wants to be a professional skateboarder/snowboarder, and we built him the perfect environment so he has no limitations in doing so. Gary wanted to to call the show "Full throttle Landscapes", which I used so much on the show that he couoldn't and since I built the pipe in the Vegas penthouse, he had to include me in on his show, so he wouldnt look like he was horkin my ideas. Too funny, it turned out really well, you'll see it in the spring I think.
2. If you could have changed one thing about your experience on Design Star, what would it be? (The way you were perceived, a certain task, an encounter with the judges or fellow contestants, etc.) Our schedules, were so demanding it just led to most of us who stuck it out, in getting the bubonic flu. I was physically and slightly mentally useless at the end. My only wish is that the people got to understand what outside influences impacted my design decisions. Doesn't matter now, but no one knew I got the room in Hawaii with a twelve foot air conditioner three feet from the foot of my bed. It functioned as the entire system for the whole ten story building, so loud you would have never been able to sleep there. And from the other room? You would have been able to sit up from your bed and watch over 500 people surf the greatest surf spot in the world, from your pillow. And a kitchen, in the bedroom? please..there was only a sink that's it. Don't kitchens have some form of heating element? To me waking up and looking down into the waves was just heaven. Huge coinsendence that my wave room occurred just before we went to Hawaii..that sucked...I got pegged as blue boy. Oh well! My fresh new Mercury Hybrid 4wd gets me to Tahoe and back really well!
I assumed that the final vote would have depended on the consistency of good innovative design and completed projects rather than the judges coming in and telling you what to do, so you do it.
3. What did your family/friends have to say after seeing you on the show? Everyone says the exact same thing,... "I was robbed". I have since traveled the northern and southern hemispheres and see tons of people in the airports and far off places, who all say the same thing. Second sucks, but a lot of good things has happened since and I am very thankful for the entire experience.
4. Have you kept in touch with fellow contestants? Who? Everyone...except "Kim" she's untouchable right now. I can't wait until she lands..lot's to catch up on she's very chill and cool. I just got back from a semi reunion in Mammoth Lakes where we had all "planned" to get together but only Scott, Lisa and "Sparkles" showed up. I had to leave early and never even saw "Sparkles"..hope to see everyone soon. I am very impressed with the casting crew who brought all of us together, they filtered through thousands and brought all of us together..really an amazing thing in my opinion. I probably would have never met these talented crazy individuals who I am now honored, to call friends.
5. What has been your weirdest fan encounter?Walking along a beach on an island of twenty inhabitants off of Ixtapa and an Israelian woman coming up, stopping and saying "I loved you on Design Star". I think I asked for her autograph at that point. Truly a huge show at that point, I knew it was big, just not..well "Bromstead big" just kidding.
6. Did you watch season 1? Who did you want to win and why? It was a no brainer from the first individual challenge, much like ours. David had the show locked, there was no comparison.
7. Would you do it all over again? Why? In a second,... then I want to host it (sorry Clive), then produce it and compete in it again.
8. What was the most important design or life lesson you learned from being on Design Star? What it meant to be part of a 200 person team, from the production crew, show runners, HGTV, our body guards/escorts and Robb, we were all part of a team trying to make something amazing happen and we did at times. It's hard to make it all go smoothly and I had a crash course in doing so at the very beginning with some of the "elevator politics", (inside joke) but I got it after my first and I feel my only confrontation with the penthouse staff and producer.
