What Grand Designs teaches us about content creation
The British TV show that just might change your mind about content creation
Gary Bloomer | SHAKING THE TREE # 261
If you’ve ever spent an evening gripped by what at times is the slow-motion car crash of a British self-build, you know the Channel 4 TV show Grand Designs.
Hosted by Kevin McCloud since 1999, Grand Designs follows ordinary people—a teacher, a baker, a graphic designer—as they attempt to build their extraordinary dream home—often with little to no experience of the process—and always with a tight budget, and with all sorts of questions, problems, and obstacles to overcome.
We watch for the drama as concrete is poured in drenching rain, as the oak beams that don’t fit have to be resized on the fly, and as the budget gets whittled away.
But as a content creator, I see something else.
I see the perfect metaphor for building content that stands the test of time.
Grand Designs isn’t a show about houses.
It’s a masterclass in crafting and managing the creative process.
Here’s what it teaches us.
1. The vision is non-negotiable (but the plans aren’t)
Every episode begins with a computer animated vision of the site and the process of building from the ground up, showing the exteriors, the interiors, the finishes: the works.
The vision often begins with nothing more complicated that a sketch on the back of an envelope. This vision is the North Star that guides every decision, and it’s often the only thing that gets the builders through the delayed delivery of materials, or the roof beams that are too short, or through the bleak midwinter when the project seems doomed.
The content lesson: Your core message, your unique point of view, your why—this is your vision. It must be sound, solid, and unshakable. It’s the thing you know you were put on this Earth to do, regardless of the opinions of other people.
But your content calendar, your specific headlines, your platform strategy? Those are the architectural plans. They must be plastic, flexible, and adaptable. Whenever you hit an obstacle (an algorithm change, a piece that flops, a major SNAFU), you don’t abandon the vision. You adapt the plan.
The couple who wanted a light-filled home didn’t scrap the dream when their glass was delayed; they found another supplier. Protect your vision at all costs and be ruthless with the tactics.
2. Embrace the “messy middle”
Grand Designs is compelling because it celebrates in the messy middle. This is the point where the excavator is stuck in mud, or where the shell of the building is exposed to the elements, or where the structure looks less like a dream home and more like a cross between a liability and a ruin.
This is the point where most projects fail, and it’s also where most content creators quit. They see the messy first draft, the confusing analytics, the tepid engagement, and they panic or become disheartened by their lack of progress.
This is where they quit because they’re nowhere near where they think they ought to be (because they’re measuring their current status as a relative newcomer against someone else who’s been creating content for the last three years). So they throw up their hands in despair and they walk away from the site.
The Content Lesson: The messy middle isn’t a sign of failure; it’s an essential and necessary phase of the construction process. Your first 50 or so articles or videos or podcasts will lag, wallow, drift and probably sink.
Instead of looking at your initial drafts and attempts as being anywhere near perfect (because they won’t be), look at them as initial sketches of your plans. Only then will they be strong enough to act is the bare concrete slab that holds everything up.
This part of the process is ugly and time consuming; it’s frustrating and maddening. You want to see results and you want to see them now.
But slow your roll because for every 100 of the people starting out in your position right now, a year, two years, THREE YEARS from now, fewer than 5% of them will still be producing content … and your goal right now is to figure out not to be one of the 95%!
This part of the process is ugly, but it’s essential.
The process of drafting and brainstorming, or editing, refining, and promoting are the cladding and glazing that transform your raw content ideas into a finished structure.
Don’t abandon your half-built blog post or podcast series because it’s not perfect yet. Lean into the mess. Embrace the process. Learn from it. Make notes on what worked and what didn’t.
Use this period to hone your production process and to sharpen your content creation skills. Taking the time to do all this will mean you’re building something real for the long term.
3. Constraints breed creativity (and character)
No one on Grand Designs has an unlimited budget and an endless timeline.
I’ll wait.
As is frequently the case, the most fascinating solutions often emerge from this pressure cooker of time and budget constraints and from an abject lack of resources: the reclaimed railway sleepers suddenly find a new home, the straw-bale insulation works better than expected, the wine-bottle glass wall is a huge hit.
The constraints of a lack of time or materials or money force us to think creatively in ways that a blank cheque never could. Resourcefulness also reveals our truer character as creators—revealing our resilience, ingenuity, and our ability to pivot.
The Content Lesson: You don’t need a massive budget or a huge team to get things done. With thought, commitment, and foresight, ultimately and with a little ingenuity, your constraints—whether they are time, equipment, software, resources, or platform limitations—can become your secret weapon.
That limited ad spend forces you to write a more compelling headline.
A tight deadline pushes you to be more decisive.
A one-person operation demands a unique, authentic voice.
Instead of seeing constraints as barriers, see them as stepping stones and as the parameters that will shape your most innovative work.
4. The reveal is earned
As content creators it’s easy to see someone else’s efforts after years of work as something we ought to be seeing right out of the gate as we set out on our content creation journey.
On every episode of Grand Designs and through the magic of television, after 45 minutes of stress and setbacks, we finally get The Reveal. The camera cuts from Kevin striding towards the site with trepidation, only to pan across the finished home, and it’s breathtaking.
But its impact isn’t just from the beauty of the finished structure; it’s earned through the struggle we’ve witnessed. What’s easy to forget or to ignore is the two years or so of toil behind the cameras and away from the spotlights.
When we take those things into consideration, the vision before us is a little different. We appreciate the polished floor because we saw it being laid in a hailstorm. We admire the soaring ceiling because we remember the fear when the crane lifted the beams into place and they were too long.
The Content Lesson: As content creators we need to stop showing our audience the polished final product. We need to share the process. We need to talk about the idea that failed, about the draft that was scrapped, and about the lesson you learned the hard way.
This showing-the-build-approach does two things: first, it goes a long way toward building trust in you as a content creator because you’ve shared the process (you’re an authentic human, not a flawless brand) and second, it dramatically increases the value of your final piece—of your final output.
When you share your journey and your process, the final article feels more insightful because you show the research that led you there. The product feels more valuable because you showed the prototype and its many versions.
Build your content cathedral
Kevin McCloud, the host of Grand Designs often call these projects “cathedrals of the self.” They are physical manifestations of a family’s values, dreams, and sheer commitment and bloody-mindedness.
At its core level, your content is no different.
It is the digital home for your ideas.
Is it a flimsy, prefab shed thrown up for a quick click? Or is it a structure built on a solid foundation, with thoughtful design, and the character that only comes from navigating the messy, beautiful, human process of creation?
Build for the long term.
Build with a vision.
And for heaven’s sake, make sure you have a good damp-proof course.
As always, thanks for reading.
—Gary
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P.S. If you found this useful, share it with another creator who needs an ego check (in a nice way). Want more unfiltered takes on content creation? Join my newsletter. No fluff, just the stuff that works.
Next time on Shaking the Tree: No one is going to do the work for you
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Originally from the U.K., Gary Bloomer is a writer, branding advocate, marketing specialist, and an award-winning graphic designer.
His design work has been included in Creative Review (one of the UK’s largest design magazines). Since 2009, he has answered over 5,000 marketing and business questions in the Know-How Exchange of MarketingProfs.com, placing him among the top 3% of contributors. He lives in Wilmington, Delaware, USA.