Bob Vila June 20

Restore, Refurbish and Renovate ala Bob Vila

Your house shouldn’t be a mere house but a home.  It needs caring and loving remodeling, refurbishing, renovating and whatever is necessary to turn it into a home as beautiful in the inside as it is in the outside.  Oh well, what can I say?  The times of the house as just a place to sleep in have long since gone.  The ideal home has increasingly become a showplace, something worthy of showing to friends, family and acquaintances.  You can thank or curse Bob Vila for this development.

Bob Vila:  The Peace Corps Volunteer

Bob Vila doesn’t have a degree in architecture or interior design.  Nope, what he has is a degree in Bachelor of Science in Journalism.  After college, he did not apply for a hotshot network job but hired on to the Peace Corps and was consequently assigned to Panama for two years.  Who could have said then that Bob Vila was destined for the TV industry anyway?

Bob Vila:  Home Restoration Expert Extraordinaire

Robert J. Vila, simply known as Bob Vila to millions of television viewers across the country, is considered by some to be the innovator who ushered in the home improvement era.  His romance with the media and American homeowners began when his efforts to restore an old Victorian Italianate villa located in Newton, MA was awarded the “Heritage House of 1978” award by the renowned magazine, Better Homes and Gardens.

Bob Vila:  The Famous TV Personality

His career had no way to go but up, and he rode his fully to the top.  This Miami based home improvement specialist of Cuban descent became a TV personality at locally made home renovation shows and series and in 1979 became a mainstay of the renowned TV show, “This Old House,” which was syndicated by PBS and aired nationwide.  Bob remained as this show’s host for 10 years and did more and more commercial endorsements as his fame spread.

The show’s producer apparently found his extra curricular activities objectionable so Bob Vila resigned and got a fresh start by becoming Sears’ official commercial endorser.  He also starred in a new TV show called “Bob Vila’s Home Again” (apparently in reference to his brief hiatus from the TV industry) which was subsequently renamed as plain “Bob Vila” in 2005.

Aside from serious home improvement TV shows, he also appeared numerous times in “Tool Time,” a comic segment of the cable TV show “Home Improvement,” where he always emerges the victor against the show’s host, Tim Allen.  He also made an appearance in the movie “Hot Shots! Part Deux” in 1993.

Then and now, his television shows are geared to help the country’s homeowners to do their own restorations to their old and aging homes.  Bob Vila continues to air step by step guides to improve rutting woodwork, stuccos, painting interiors and exteriors, reinforcing weak columns, and so on and so forth.  He, in association with the federal Alliance for Safe Homes or FLASH, also began the campaign on awareness for storm-ready homes particularly in Florida.

Bob Vila:  The Writer

Bob Vila did not simply become the home improvement TV icon but proceeded to use his journalistic training to write self-help books on home improvement.  Currently, his book count has reached ten.  Five of these books are a series entitled “Bob Vila’s Guide to Historic Homes of America.”