In the largest design center on the West Coast, with 130 showrooms of cutting edge fabrics, flooring and furniture, 12 people are competing for a celebrity mystery client’s choice of "Top Design".  Last night marked the premier episode of Bravo’s new series and with judges like Jonathan Adler, Kelly Wearstler and Margaret Russell, design never looked so serious. With a $50,000 budget and limited time, contestants were paired off and left to design a room based on several, unique (and strange) objects dear to the celebrity mystery client.

It was exciting as each team shopped the Pacific Design Center and created various spaces based on their own personal talent and taste as well as that of the unknown client. The bloggers at Design Sponge were a bit disappointed with the show’s debut, commenting that Todd Oldham seemed like an "animatronic host".  Even though his lines did seem a bit rehearsed he did offer the contestants encouragement as well as advice during the evening’s challenge.

Design Sponge is willing to give the contestants one more chance (as well as the show) in hopes that their individual personal styles will have a chance to shine a bit more. And shine they will; Jonathan Adler says, in his blog, that he was so impressed by their efforts and ideas, he gives them "mad props for their chops".

Margaret Russell, editor in chief of Elle Decor Magazine, notes in her blog that though she may be cranky and demanding as a judge,this show is supposed to be about surprising and inspiring design, like something you’d see in a magazine. While the beautiful layouts you see in magazines take a lot longer than these contestants were given for their challenge to fully reach a point of completion, Kelly Wearstler had a hard time letting two designers "go" at the end of the show….

….. "we knew how hard the designers must have worked. Going from schematic
to conceptual to design to implementation and installation in such a
short amount of time…I can’t imagine."

All in all, I loved it! I felt for the contestants and their frustrations as well as the thrill of doing what they love most. And the two contestants that are not coming back next week were not my choice at all, so I will be tuning in to see if my least favorite designers get booted off in episode #2. I feel an addiction starting……..