Inside Stacey Solomon’s jaw-dropping family home makeovers for new show Sort Your Life Out
MOVE over Marie Kondo. In the BBC’s brand new home-revamp show, Sort Your Life Out, Stacey Solomon, 32, and a crew of keen tidying experts help miserable families transform their homes and lives.
The bubbly Celeb Gogglebox star and her wonder team (organizer Dilly, carpenter Rob and cleaner Iwan) spend a whole week with each messy clan, decluttering, cleaning, decorating and upcycling.
The feel-good, family-friendly series is a tale of two halves, starting with stripping the houses bare and laying out the family’s possessions in a warehouse – like some strange art installation of their lives.
The families, often gobsmacked at the stuff they’ve accumulated over the years, then sort through their treasures and junk, to decide what gets the chop.
Will Stacey be a ruthless chucker-outer or will there be a bit of the dreaded C-word – compromise? Viewers will just have to wait and see!
In the other part of the programme, a squad gives the pads a spring clean that would put Kim and Aggie to shame, right before getting stuck into a budget-friendly makeover.
Talk about a proper fresh start!
The Sun gets an exclusive before-and-after look inside the best of these domestic glam-ups…
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The Paines
Sort Your Life Our first heads to Gloucester, where Stacey and the team help single Mum Steph and her three daughters.
Over time, the Paines have amassed a whopping 111 bottles of nail varnish, 80 packs of out-of-date medicine and over 1000 books.
Emotions run high as the family relinquish control to this hard-working bunch of organising fanatics, but it’s all worth it in the end.
Don’t just take our word for it though – look at the state of the living room and one of the bedrooms before the crew work their magic.
There was no room to swing a cat, with every possible surface strewn with the family’s domestic detritus – clothes, CDs, toys, and all sorts of other odds and ends.
Now, Steph and her brood have a neat and tidy space to call home, and it’s completely unrecognisable.
All belongings that made the cut sit neatly in their place, little bits and bobs tucked away in nifty storage solutions maximising the space.
Crisp and clean lines meet plush soft furnishings in this swanky makeover, creating a welcoming home equal parts minimalist and comfy.
The Patels
In the second episode of the show, Stacey and her merry band of tidiers make their way down to London to rescue a couple and their energetic young kids from a domestic nightmare.
The Patels are drowning in a sea of stuff, including a staggering 387 bits of tupperware, 1011 bangles and more than 2000 toys.
Bijal and Darshan both come from families of hoarders, and so struggle to part with their things, but the couple’s determination to create a chaos-free environment for their easily distracted son keeps their eyes on the prize.
Before, the Patel’s kitchen was a messy jumble of possessions where nothing had a home of its own.
Now, the clan have a kitchen domestic goddess Nigella would be proud of, with jars and bottles making way for plants and – shock horror – actual worktops.
And the rest of the digs are just as flash too, creating a calming space where Bijal and Darshan’s little boy can focus.
The Bradshaws
It’s Cornwall after that for Stacey and her cleaning crusaders, where they face their greatest challenge yet with craft loving Sue and retired electrician Wayne.
As the couple try their hardest to push off 30 years of clobber, Sue is emotional to reveal her son Alex is too mortified to bring pals home.
Wayne loves a car boot sale more than the average person, while daughter Harriet worries her parents will become overwhelmed by the clutter – including a jaw-dropping 100 knitting needles, 81 fondue forks and 204 lipsticks.
Tensions rise as big decisions are made, and although there are quarrels, everyone agrees something has to be done about the crazy shambles.
Luckily the mess in Sue’s craft room is dealt with, transforming the space into a proper workshop stuffed with little cubby holes perfect for paint brushes, bobbins and buttons.
We’re sure the creative juices will flow nicely in here!
Elsewhere, the Sort Your Life Out crew rejig the kitchen and breathe new life into old but much-loved items, creating an inviting place the Bradshaw kids can feel proud to bring their mates.
The Dowlings
Stacey and her dream team head to Manchester in episode four, where they come to the aid of full-time mum Cherelle, courier Tony, and four kids all under the age of four.
The Dowlings have a chaotic two-bed home in desperate need of a radical space-saving reorganisation.
However, with the Sort Your Life Out crew on hand to help, not to worry – the big question is can they find a lost engagement ring among the clutter?
Just a few obstacles to get in their way are an eye-popping 34 odd kids’ shoes, 50 new born baby hats and over 1000 toys.
It’s an emotional and tense time for the family as they pour through their things, but they work as a team and get the difficult job done.
The amazing outcome is waving goodbye to this disaster zone, all cramped and mismatched.
Now, the little ones get to say hello to this oasis, a true picture of peace and order.
Carefully selected soft furnishings work well alongside soothing tones in this tranquil kids’ room, and the little names on each bunk-bed are almost too cute to handle.
Space is maximised here and in the rest of the pad too, leaving the Dowlings with a stress-free space they can enjoy coming home to instead of dreading.
Sort Your Life Out starts on Thursday November 4th, BBC One, 8pm.