After first breaking out onto the HGTV scene in 2016 with their home renovation series based in Indianapolis, the beloved mother-daughter duo Karen Laine and Mina Starsiak-Hawk have proven to tackle any demolition with a unique style and flair. For its latest season, the popular pair has admittedly set a “pretty high bar” for themselves, with Starsiak-Hawk revealing to PopCulture.com in an exclusive ahead of Tuesday’s hotly-anticipated Season 5 premiere that the fresh block of episodes will be unlike its previous seasons.
“[The episodes are] what people have come to expect from the show. We set a pretty high bar as far as you go for our projects. It’s still all the big overhauls, the crazy demos,” the soon-to-be mother-of-two said, relating to a previous chat with PopCulture of how something very “terrible” and dramatic occurred during their renovations. “That ended up not really being a renovation, because of something that happened. […] But, we have some really awesome renovations that are super fun.”
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Discussing the premiere episode airing June 9 at 8 p.m. ET on HGTV called “Fountain Square Flashback,” Starsiak-Hawk shares how the renovations this year have been inspiring, especially with how her team is tackling some of the more “custom” renovations. “They’ll be unique. The homeowner renovations, we get to cater to their style. Those ones are exciting,” she said. With Starsiak-Hawk and mom, Laine, returning to the Fountain Square neighborhood to renovate a charming bungalow bought from the original homeowner, the two give the home an eclectic California vibe by combining its unique features with modern touches.
With Starsiak-Hawk “excited” to kick the season off with the premiere episode, she further shares how this season is different from previous years thanks to her “wildly talented” and “incredible” production team amplifying their style and sophistication. “They’re always — not only competing with other shows for making our show the most beautiful it can be — but with themselves,” she said. “What cool new cameras can we get? What lenses can we get? We have a drone now, which, is awesome.”
She further shares how not only does the show’s appearance look different, but it plays perfectly to the vibe of Indy, showcasing the best parts of her home state’s Midwestern city with the help of a licensed drone operator. “Our second camera got licensed. They’re able to do so many cool shots with that — that’s 100 percent credit to them because it’s all our producer, Adam [Bradley], and just the rest of the production team constantly pushing to make the show prettier when it comes across on TV. They do a really, really good job of it. They still won’t edit out my zits in post-production, but other than that, they do a great job,” she laughed.
While fans undoubtedly love Laine’s penchant for getting creative by finding “treasures” in every home, one of the most enjoyable aspects of the Indianapolis-based series is how the mother and daughter team hunt for accessories to bring out the character of a home they renovated. It’s something the pair steadily maintain in every home while perusing their state’s unique knick-knacks and eclectic offerings.
“The best benefits I get, that people maybe don’t realize from the show is, we have so many really, really cool vendors and talented people. Within a drive, even if it’s an hour or so from where we are. We have some new guys. They’re from Osgood, Indiana, which is about an hour and a half from here called Iron Timbers. It’s brothers and their dad — they’re gingers, which is just happenstance,” the red-headed 35-year-old joked. “We really like to be able to do that stuff. We go out to their facility in Osgood and work with them out there, then they come to Indy and solve stuff on site. We definitely have a lot of that, still in Season 5.”
Good Bones Season 5 premieres at a special time on June 9 at 8 p.m. ET on HGTV before the OWN Town Hall, airing across all of Discovery’s networks at 9 p.m. ET. Fans can tune into Good Bones every Tuesday at 9 p.m. ET following this event. Stay tuned to PopCulture.com for more with Starsiak-Hawk, including what she thinks of her mother’s retirement. For all your reality TV coverage and more, follow us on Twitter @PopCulture.com.
