Bravo Top Design

From LoveToKnow Reality-TV

Bravo Top Design is a reality competition show that pits interior designers against each other for a $100,000 grand prize and the chance to display their work at a New York City interior design showcase.

Bravo Top Design – Show Format

Bravo has a whole franchise of career competition reality TV shows, like Top Chef, Shear Genius (which focuses on hair stylists), and the uber successful Project Runway (fashion design). Top Design follows a similar format as all of these shows. The contestants compete in a short competition for a chance to earn immunity for the episode, and then they compete in a larger elimination challenge. A panel of judges critiques their work and decides which interior designer will be eliminated from the competition.

Once the initial group of interior designers is whittled down to a group of finalists, they then compete in an elimination challenge to determine the winner of the show. This challenge is usually larger than all of the others, and many of the past contestants are brought back to help the finalists complete the work.

There is one deviation from the Bravo formula in the Top Design format. The short immunity challenge – called Pop Design – is not always at the start of the episode as it is on other Bravo shows. Instead, Pop Design can come at any point, even after the elimination challenge has begun, and it is often used to throw a wrench in the work that has already gone into the elimination challenge activity.

Bravo Top Design: Judges,Hosts and Winners

The line up for the first season was:

Todd Oldham – Host
Jonathan Adler – Judge
Kelly Wearstler – Judge
Margaret Russell – Judge

The first season of the show, despite being heavily advertised during the popular Top Chef and premiering after the Top Chef finale, was a ratings flop for Bravo. For this reason, the team on the show was mixed up a little bit for season two. Todd Oldham was kept on the show, but rather than hosting the show he became a teacher/mentor not unlike Tim Gunn’s role in Project Runway. India Hicks was brought on as the host of season two, which was a bigger ratings winner for the network.

Season one of Bravo Top Design was won by Matt Lorenz while Nathan Thomas took home the prize in the second season.

Top Design Winners: Where Are They Now?

Bravo’s Top Chef and Project Runway tend to turn their winners (and other cast members) into quasi-celebrities. They often appear doing the rounds on other TV shows and in other media. The Bravo Top Design winners, like the Shear Genius winners, have not yet found this level of public recognition. Matt Lorenz is running his own interior design firm in Chicago and Nathan Thomas is running his own interior design studio in New York.