Interior design show becomes a cable sensation

BEDFORD, N.Y. -- She's not a movie star or a musician. Yet Genevieve Gorder stands surrounded by six teen-age girls, each thrusting bits of paper toward her to sign.

A designer, Gorder is taking a break from splashing "coffee-toned" paints on the walls and ceiling of a suburban bedroom for The Learning Channel program "Trading Spaces."

"It's the only thing I watch obsessively," said Jess Netro, 17, who hung out with her friends in a driveway across the street from a home being invaded by the cable show's cameras.

Netro's not alone in her devotion to a program about interior design. "Trading Spaces" has become a sensation that has set ratings records for TLC, developed its own heartthrob (hunky carpenter Ty Pennington) and spawned a spinoff bound to create marital discord.

"Trading Spaces" got an Emmy nomination Thursday, and even has its own lingo: The "reveal" is the moment when participants discover -- to their delight or horror -- what their neighbor hath wrought on their home.

A mix of a reality and game show, "Trading Spaces" takes neighbors who agree, with a professional designer's help, to make over a room in the other's home. They have two days to work and a $1,000 spending limit.

"We're the ultimate neighborhood gossip show," said Denise Cramsey, executive producer of "Trading Spaces" for Banyan Productions. "Everyone wonders what's going on in their neighbors' house. Now we're in the neighbors' house and we're creating what's going on."

Countless reruns

TLC didn't expect much when it got the rights to a British show, "Changing Rooms," to remake for an American audience. But it caught on quickly after its premiere in September 2000, and the network moved it from a weekday afternoon time slot to Saturday nights.

As is customary for many cable networks when a hit blossoms, the show is rerun relentlessly throughout the week.

"I've lost count," said TLC executive Stephen Schwartz, laughing, when asked how many times a week it airs.

Cramsey sees success in more than the ratings. She gets 300 applications each day from neighbors who want to trade spaces; it used to be 50. When Schwartz's wife wore a "Trading Spaces" cap on vacation this month, strangers approached her to ask how to be on the show.

The Bedford neighbors, Amy Suffredini and Amy Minasian, coaxed their husbands to participate. They're both friends and relatives -- Amy Suffredini and Phil Minasian are cousins -- who bought homes on the same street in the past few years.

They've renovated extensively, but neither had done much with their master bedrooms.

Amy Minasian is the show's biggest fan.

"I like the before and after," she said. "I like the idea of doing it for only $1,000 and seeing how much of a dramatic change can be made."