After a restful Christmas, Dermot Bannon is ready to return to our screens, as the 14th season of Room to Improve begins on Sunday 8 January.
As it turns out, it was a milestone Christmas for the Bannon family, as it was the first time they had a "normal" Christmas in the home Dermot renovated on his own episode of Room to Improve.
"It was busy,", he says over the phone. "It was the first Christmas post-pandemic where we were able to have people around, so I had all the family around. I feel bit wrecked after the whole thing. But it was great, it was lovely. And the kids had a great time and everybody was well fed.
"The last couple of years, even when restrictions were a little bit lifted, we had a close contact in the house so we couldn't have anyone over. So this is the first time we've had kind of a big family gathering in the house, which was great."
Like everyone else, he spent the Christmas season soaking up the festive cheer, as pubs were filled, shops were heaving and people finally felt a bit more comfortable spending time together after two stunted Christmases. He even fit in a whistle-stop trip to Barcelona with his wife and kids.
Filming this season of Room to Improve, however, Dermot and his team found himself caught between pandemic hold-ups and post-pandemic freedom. Two of the four episodes were filmed with restrictions still in place, while the last two have been started in "normal" circumstances,
Not that he was completely complaining about the hold-ups, either. "To be really honest, sometimes when things were delayed by the pandemic, it was a little bit of a break and the pace of work wasn't as quick because okay, the site has shut down and there's nothing we can do about it. Whereas with this, two of the episodes were filmed during the pandemic and the other two weren't."
When the only way she'll move is if Dermot Bannon designs the house… you get Dermot Bannon to design the house!#RoomToImprove is back! Sunday at 9.30pm | @RTEOne & @RTEPlayer pic.twitter.com/OA0eRPRzl2
— RTÉ One (@RTEOne) January 4, 2023
Filming the hit show is a constant process, he says, with projects finishing up just as new ones are beginning.
"It keeps rolling, so which is great because it means it gives us the time to get everything done. But it also means that there's never any start, middle or finish to it. You always have projects at different stages throughout the year. The problem is that you don't ever get to the end of it."
As always, the Room to Improve team have strived to make this season better than the last, bringing a host of new faces with unique challenges to Dermot's door. First up are Amy and Conor, who set about renovating Conor's grandmother's farmhouse in Co. Offaly.
Describing it a a "chocolate box" house, Dermot says it was a stunning traditional farmhouse. "My only job was just, what was there already? Okay, it needed renovation, but it was really beautiful.
"My job was not to destroy that. My job was just to kind of put in something that was simple. It's always lovely to work on the quintessential Irish farmhouse and they needed a kind of sizeable enough extension, but I needed not to destroy the original yard and the original courtyard."
Another challenge was guiding the young couple, who were set to be married, through the process as differing opinions and needs came to the fore. "I think how different their needs where it only came out in the middle of the episode", he says.
"It was his grandmother's house. For Amy it was all about putting your own stamp onto it, whereas you're kind of sometimes going up against a family with that."
Part and parcel of that, he says, was bringing the couple back down to earth when it came to their expectations. "The big difference between the kind of first-time buyers and first-time homeowners and the kind of people who are a bit more seasoned is it's like the dream. They have a lot built up in their head about what this is going to be like, and they can get very overwhelmed by the process.
"There's a lot of kind of down-to-earth moments of bringing it back home and saying, this isn't going to work."
Amy and Conor are just two of the young people who are returning to their roots, Dermot says, as the pandemic and hybrid working freed people from the countryside from being stuck working in cities.
"What you're seeing is opportunities for people, especially for younger couples who might still be involved in GAA clubs down the country and they might be living in the city.
"Being able to buy an older derelict house and then get the grants that are going with it, to be able to live close to family and close to their networks and close to their friends. I often feel like sometimes for people who live in rural Ireland, there was always this kind of pressure that eventually if you want to do a certain job, you're going to have to move to a city.
"Some people just never kind of settle there. They're always kind of yearning to get back to where they're from, where they grew up, where their roots are."
He also promises to explore more relatable projects in the new series, such as a three-bed semi with a small budget, something that came from listening to fans on social media.
"A lot of people on Twitter and social media last year were kind of 'is there any chance of seeing a smaller, more regular house?', so we went out looking for the most average house in Ireland, which is a three bed semi with a small budget, and to see what we could do with that. Could we introduce a little bit of wow and sparkle to a house that is the house that practically everyone in the country lives in?
"Obviously, you can't take too much of [social media]. But I think that there's a general consensus you have to listen to. So if a lot of people are saying, I'd love to see a smaller house, I love to see a smaller house, you can't really ignore it. I do watch it, but for constructive criticism and also just I think it's good to read the room."
Watch Room to Improve on Sunday at 9:35pm on RTÉ One.
