The BEST episodes of Grand Designs
Every episode of Grand Designs ever, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Grand Designs!
Presenter Kevin McCloud follows some of Britain's most ambitious self-building projects, as intrepid individuals attempt to design and construct the home of their dreams.
#3 - Kennington, 2012
Season 12 - Episode 5 - Aired 10/17/2012
Kevin McCloud marks the 100th episode with one of the programme's most ambitious projects to date. Leigh Osborne and Graham Voce want to convert and extend a landmark 150-year-old water tower in central London into a luxury home. Grade II-listed, derelict and with 6ft-thick walls, it's a huge challenge for the pair, who also plan to build two structures at the base - a lift shaft connected by a series of glass tunnels, and a modern living space. The result will be a four-bedroom property over nine floors, complete with a room at the top offering spectacular 360 degree views across the capital. The tower, which is located directly above London Underground's Northern Line, was originally built for Lambeth Workhouse in 1877 and became a Grade II listed building in 2008.
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#4 - Yorkshire, 2007
Season 7 - Episode 1 - Aired 2/28/2007
Every Englishman’s home is his castle but for Francis Shaw this is quite literally true. He and his wife, Karen, and their two young daughters, bought the ruins of a 14th Century castle in Yorkshire and took on the remarkable challenge of turning a pile of stones into a beautiful home. Surrounded by rolling green fields, the location is idyllic; however, the castle itself was little more than four crumbling walls.
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#5 - Monmouthshire 2014
Season 14 - Episode 9 - Aired 10/29/2014
Kevin McCloud returns to a unique Japanese-Welsh fusion home in the Wye Valley to see how the improvised building weathered one of the wettest winters on record. Tamayo Hussey has missed Japan ever since she moved to the UK 15 years ago with her husband Nigel. To stave off the homesickness they decided to transform their home into a one-of-a-kind Japanese house - complete with Japanese roof bath, tatami room and paper sliding walls. Kevin finds out if it has brought the calm and tranquillity Tamayo remembers from her childhood in Japan.
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#7 - Lizard Peninsula, 2010
Season 10 - Episode 6 - Aired 10/20/2010
Kevin meets interior designer Kathryn Tyler, who has decided the best way onto the property ladder is to design and build her own house in her parents' back garden in Falmouth.
#8 - Sussex, 2003
Season 3 - Episode 3 - Aired 2/26/2003
For 10 years, Ben lived in tents and caravans in a wood in West Sussex. As a woodsman, he needed and wanted to live among the trees. But after a battle with planning he finally got permission to build himself a house with more creature comforts. He invited volunteers to help him build one by hand, from the materials growing around him.
#9 - Living in the Country
Season 15 - Episode 4 - Aired 7/30/2015
Kevin McCloud looks at the challenges of self-building in the countryside, where design must embrace and enhance tradition, yet often overcome stringent planning constraints. Drawing on footage from the show's 15-year history, as well as new visits to extraordinary homes, he finds out how pioneers at the forefront of architecture are transforming agricultural and historic buildings, and bringing cutting-edge contemporary design to rural parts.
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#11 - Tiverton 2013
Season 13 - Episode 4 - Aired 9/25/2013
When he lost three limbs in Afghanistan, Jon's life changed forever. Now he wants to build a house that allows him to live independently. The design is cutting edge, but the budget spirals. Marine captain Jon's life changed forever when he stepped on a land mine. Before his injuries, home for Jon had meant a crooked chocolate box Devon cottage. After countless viewings of uninspiring specialist dwellings and awkward conversions, they realised that the only way to get a house that would enable Jon to live independently was to build it themselves. The design boasts sleek glass walls, open plan spaces and a dramatic wing-like roof. Crucially the design concept is for there to be no noticeable adaptations due to Jon's disabilities. Despite his lack of experience, Jon decides to project manage and calls on the support of a number of military charities for this hugely ambitious project. The pressure to finish on time increases when Becky discovers she is pregnant.
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#12 - Wyre Forest 2015
Season 16 - Episode 4 - Aired 9/30/2015
Kevin McCloud follows the progress of 37-year-old Angelo Mastropietro, as he transforms a damp, dark and abandoned cave in Worcestershire. Having recently been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, Angelo wants to create a retreat to help him cope with the news and become a 21st century caveman. He has a budget of £100,000 and plans to almost single-handedly carve, cut and drill into the hillside to make the cave comfortable for contemporary living. However, there is no manual for a project of this kind, and the unique challenge soon becomes an obsession.
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#13 - Kent, 2005
Season 5 - Episode 4 - Aired 4/27/2005
John Cadney and Marnie Moon have never had a permanent home. For 16 years they've camped on land owned by Marnie's parents because they could never afford to buy a house in the area where they live. So John, a carpenter, rolled his sleeves up and decided to build a house for his family with his bare hands. After much searching for the right kind of house they settled on an environmentally friendly four-bedroom log cabin. The whole thing was imported from Finland as hundreds of pre-cut bits of wood. All John had to do is figure out how it all fits together!
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#15 - Living in the Wild
Season 15 - Episode 2 - Aired 7/16/2015
In the second of four special programmes, Kevin McCloud looks at the challenges of self-building in the UK's most remote places, where beautiful landscapes often meet savage weather. Drawing on footage from 15 years of the programme, as well as new visits to extraordinary and incredible homes, Kevin reveals which designs work best, and why. Along the way, he interviews pioneers at the forefront of architecture in the wilderness and sees the astonishing lengths people go to live on the edges of society.
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#16 - County Derry 2014
Season 14 - Episode 4 - Aired 9/24/2014
A young farmer and architect in Northern Ireland hopes to make a home out of four large shipping containers welded together to form a giant cross. Patrick Bradley has come up with a £100k house design to be built out of four 45-foot shipping containers, welded together to form a giant cross and cantilevered over the top of a stream at a beautiful secluded spot on the family farm. His mum is hoping his new home will get Patrick a girlfriend. But his tiny budget is soon under threat.
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#17 - Skye, 2012
Season 12 - Episode 7 - Aired 10/31/2012
Kevin McCloud meets artists Indi and Rebecca, who are planning to build a modern, larch-clad home on the Isle of Skye, with a second hand-crafted building alongside to use as their studio, all on a tight budget of £150,000. They have been saving for years, but making it happen will mean taking on the savage weather, not to mention the sceptical locals - and as if that weren't enough, most of the work is being done by one man, local builder Donald.
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#18 - Birmingham, 2007
Season 7 - Episode 6 - Aired 4/4/2007
Dean Marks has dreamt of living in a church for as long as he can remember. After searching for the right building for years, he came across St Martin’s near Birmingham, a huge 18th century grade II listed church which looks more like a mausoleum. The church wanted £25,000 for it but Dean knocked them down to £12,500. Now, after fighting for planning permission for four years, Dean and his wife, Hilary, are about to transform this derelict monstrosity into a family home.
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#19 - Yorkshire, 2009
Season 9 - Episode 8 - Aired 3/18/2009
Not everyone gets to live out their childhood dreams, but in 2004 Francis Shaw did exactly that when he bought a crumbling castle on English Heritage’s Buildings at Risk register, to restore. Little did he know what he was letting himself and his family in for by taking on this project. Set in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales, the peel tower dates back to the 15th century and was protected as a Scheduled Ancient Monument. It took months of red tape wrangling before Francis finally got permission to start working on the building, but with the rubble barely cleared, one of the enormous 700-year-old walls collapsed showing just how much of a labour of love this project was going to be. Two and a half years after Francis and his wife Karen moved in, Kevin McCloud returns to find out that the spiralling costs of restoring the castle has meant the fairytale life is nothing like Francis’s dream.
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#20 - South Cornwall
Season 17 - Episode 3 - Aired 10/5/2016
Kevin McCloud meets Tom and Danielle Raffield, whose lifelong passion has been steam-bending wood. They've used the technique to create extraordinary furniture and lighting, but now plan to use it on a larger scale. In an attempt to escape the confines of their tiny gamekeeper's lodge, they have decided to build a wavy wooden house in South Cornwall, completed with curved cladding, twisted furniture and interior walls covered with weathered timber. With a £100,000 budget, the pair have decided to do a lot of the building themselves, and Kevin is on hand to discover whether they're up to the challenge.
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#21 - Hertfordshire, 2012
Season 12 - Episode 2 - Aired 9/19/2012
Kevin McCloud meets a pair of civil partnered university professors who have decided to build their first home from scratch. In addition to all the complications this usually entails, they have also enlisted the services of industrial designers who have developed a new computer-assisted method for cutting precision-engineered building blocks from scratch. However, though the technique may be clever, its creators have never created a building before - meaning everyone involved with the project is taking a giant leap into the unknown.
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#22 - Revisit: Tuscany, 2007
Season 7 - Episode 11 - Aired 5/9/2007
Kevin McCloud meets a couple who bought a ruin and moved to Italy in 1999, hoping to start work building their dream home in Tuscany. Since then they've spent all their time trying to get planning permission, but finally, after four years, they are about to start work. And it's an epic project: they have bought a derelict 1,000-year-old castle in the Tuscan hills. Now, the couple face their biggest battle of all: rebuilding this massive ruin into a comfortable and luxurious five-bedroom home.
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#23 - South Somerset 2015
Season 16 - Episode 6 - Aired 10/14/2015
Kevin McCloud follows the progress of private chef Ed Versluys and pilates instructor Vicky Anderson, who want to convert a concrete cowshed in the Somerset countryside into a three bedroom home. With the help of one young builder and the knowledge they can learn from the internet, the couple plan to project manage the conversion themselves. However, they have only eight months and a budget of just over £200k to make a warm and comfortable home with straw bale walls and wide expanses of glass.
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#25 - South Downs 2015
Season 16 - Episode 7 - Aired 10/21/2015
Kevin McCloud follows the progress of Stephen Yeoman and Anita Findlay, who want to build a cutting-edge, post-industrial house covered in rusty metal. However, their prominent riverside plot in the traditional and architecturally conservative area of South Downs means everyone will be watching. The project proves to be a real rollercoaster when the fitting of the rusty steel cladding goes wrong, cash flow problems threaten to bring work to a halt, and the couple announce that a baby is on the way.
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