DS7EP6: The White Box Challenge ....AGAIN!!!

This is getting old. Yes, I know, The White Box Challenge is the most popular challenge EVER but, well, after they did it once, they did it again last week, only the White Box had to become a Hollywood Party Lounge.

This week's White Box Challenge was to turn a White Box into a Kitchen. Oh, they threw a curve ball by making you design the room around a pre-selected sink, but then they took points off if you designed the kitchen around the sink; or, as in Manley and Hilari's case, they took points off if you didn’t design the kitchen around the sink.

There's no winning on this show.

Plus, they let Danielle pick her Mystery Sink first, and then assign sinks to others and pair them off in teams of two. Why she picked Britany as her teammate is a Mystery Sink to me because last week Britany came in second, behind Danielle and all she did was whine about how she should have won. I would have paired that bitch up with Manley because you just know that's a disaster in the making.

But let's get into the kitchen and start cooking up....and I’m ‘a keep this short because it's a holiday, y'all.....

DANIELLE & BRITANY--The Stainless Sink

Their sink was a modern sink, with a cool nunchuck looking faucet, which I thought Danielle might use if Britany starts whining again. I mean, it's always good to have a weapon when working with some of these high-strung designers.

Meanwhile, back at the sink, they decided to go for a more eclectic look in the kitchen with pops of color. So they chose white cabinets and a gray countertop and painted the walls mint green.

I must have missed the memo that said mint green is a pop of color.

And evidently they did too, because once the color was up, they freaked. Luckily, Britany said she had some yellow paint to use on the "fake" door that would be just the punch the room needed. Um, Britany? Honey? Let. Me. Speak. Slowly. Butter. Yellow. Is. Not. a. Pop. Of Color.

So, they went to the flower store for pinks and yellows, in actual bright colors. And, well, since this is obviously Flower Design Star it was a good choice.

Not so good was Britany's idea of putting.....wait for it.....it's good......framed pieces of newspaper along the wall as a back splash. Yeah, cleaning the grease off picture frames will be a snap for the modern day home-maker; or in my case, homo-home-maker.

But I think Danielle's accessorizing saved them. The kitchen turned from modern sink to country-looking cabinets to a battered buffet and an industrial shelving unit and it all seemed to work; though for the life of me, what the eff was a yellow suitcase doing on the top shelf? Is that in case the meal is so horrendous the chef can make a quick escape?

Still, props to Danielle for finishing a job. Props to Danielle for not beating the crap out of Britany.

And, for Britany, well, I've made fun of her all seaon. I've called her a baby. I've called her Design Barbie. I've made fun of her 'talent'.

That's all.

MIKEL & RACHEL--The Country Sink

It was a cool double sink, with kind of a Tuscan design on it, with birds, and eggs or, well, some kind of kitchen-looking design, in blues and yellows. So Mikel and Rachel decided to go full bore--emphasis on bore--country.

But without those messy upper cabinets. Yeah, Rachel was set on having no uppers at all, and the Cabinets-To-Go™ guy was so freaked out, that he freaked out Mikel, and they gang cabineted Rachel into doing at least two walls of uppers. But the back wall would be her 'feature' wall with wallpaper.

Ominous drumming because wallpaper never works. And their choice followed suit. While it was yellow, with gray added to it, which kind of matched the sink a little, it seemed washed out against the gray walls. So, it was back to Wallpaper Store™ to find something new, perhaps in red, because there wasn't a hint of red anywhere in that room, unless you counted Mikel's rising blood pressure.

See, that new wallpaper, in red and white looked like blood splatter from a distance; it looked so much like blood splatter that I half-expected Dexter to come into the room....and then take Rachel away and make her pay for this senseless crime.

And the wallpaper made the crystal and wrought iron chandelier that Mikel bought, completely disappear in the space. Unfortunately, for Mikel, the mismatched chairs he picked for an eclectic country look around the table didn't work, because, well, the four chair were actually two sets so it didn't look 'collected' it looked arbitrary; it looked like the owners couldn’t decide which chairs they liked so they bought two of each.

Now, onto Rachel's island. It was a good idea. The kitchen needed an island. What it didn't need was an island that left about ten inches between the island and the sink. What was she thinking? That the judges wouldn't walk around the island? How about moving the island forward about a foot or so, and then taking that table, bumping it up against the island, and making it look like one large piece. Problem solved, eh?

I really should try out for this show, or at least be the snark host who wanders though all those White Boxes and makes fun of them. I wonder how much that would pay.....

Pay. Paper. Wallpaper. Oh, yeah, Rachel’s hideous wallpaper was also run behind the stove, because nothing repels grease stains like wallpaper.

STANLEY & HILARI--The Farmhouse Sink

I was worried about the farmhouse sink because that seemed more country than Mikel and Rachel’s sink. But this sink was black, and very cool. And, I thought, a good jumping off point, if the designers hadn’t been Stanley and Hilari.

See, all Stanley heard from the instructions was "pop of color" and so, along with this black sink, he chose a brilliant blue wall color. And then Hilari looked at the black sink and brilliant blue walls and picked a crimson countertop,

Black. Blue. Red. Throw in some yellow and you'd have a Dick Tracy cartoon. In fact, if Hilari had found other letters, besides the ones that spelled 'soup' she could have put BAM! and POW! on the walls.

And a Bat Pole down one side.

Now, as if that wasn’t bad enough, Stanley found some ceramic hands in all kinds of configurations and decided they just screamed door hardware. Yes, life-sixed hands on each and every cabinet door. Rock on! Peace! Hey there! F**k You!

All he needed was one waving Bye-Bye because as soon as those handles went up I knew he was going home.

Of course, couple the hands with his cheesy Camera Challenge and it was clear Stanley would be on the next Surf Board outta LA.

EVALUATION

The guest judges this week were the Kissing, er, Kitchen Cousins, hotties Anthony Carino and John Colaneri. Anthony never met a pair of jeans he couldn't fill out, and John knows how work a tight T. Kissing, er, Kitchen Cousins, Wednesday nights at 8:30, 7:30 Central on HGTV.

The Gorder was dressed in her finest 80s wear, with her finest 80s hair, and her finest I-Schtupped-My-Way-Into-This-Job sense of superiority.

And Vern was dressed like a Ventriloquist's dummy. Now, I don't say this because he's height challenged....well, not just because he's height challenged....but because that plaid sports coat made me wonder if Wayland Flowers was gonna step out and shove his hand up Vern's ass and......

Oh. Different show.

Back to evaluations. It was quick. Danielle and Britany get the first crit. Loved It. Good job. Why that stupid backsplash. And then they get the win.

That leaves us Stanley and Hilari, Rachel and Mikel.

I called Stanley and Rachel and I was right. Rachel wept, Stanley said, "Duh, I'm an artist and I'm gonna go home and paint my kitchen blue."

Good luck with that.

MY TAKE

I'm growing annoyed with the show--and I do so every year about this time. And the producers must agree because they keep doing double eliminations, probably hoping to get this mess off the air quickly.

First up, why the team challenges if you rate them individually. If Stanley gets bashed for those not-very-handy-hand pulls, then Hilari should get bashed for it, too. They were a team and she let him do it.

Like Danville getting dinged for Britany's stupid picture backsplash; and Mikel should have been smacked for not stopping that wallpaper mess.

See, if it's Design Star, then let them work separately and critique them, separately, sand see who really knows how to design.

And stop this kitchen "design" crap. I mean, the producers laid out the kitchen floors and told the designers how it should look, where to place the cabinets, the windows, the appliances. Give them an actual kitchen to redo, or give them a completely blank slate and let them run with it. And stop this whole "You have sixteen hours" crap. Not even the Kitchen Cousins do a job in sixteen hours and this is their thing; how do you expect the designers to do it that quick.

Seriously.

 Let them design if you're gonna call it Design Star.

Or else just call it We're Looking For Someone Who Can Look Okay On Camera And Pretend They Know What They're Doing Star.

What did YOU think?