‘Good Bones: Risky Business’ Star Mina Starsiak Hawk Teases ‘No More Private Moments’ in HGTV Spinoff (Exclusive)

After winning the hearts of audiences with Good Bones alongside her mom Karen E. Laine, HGTV star Mina Starsiak Hawk is taking on her biggest, riskiest renovation challenge yet with her spinoff series, Good Bones: Risky Business premiering this Tuesday, Sept. 6 at 9 p.m. ET on HGTV and discovery+. The miniseries will feature Hawk going at it on her own without the Two Chicks & a Hammer crew to purchase the historic Sanders House in the Indianapolis neighborhood of Fountain Square. Tackling the 7,000-square-foot property, which includes the main home and a carriage house, the renovation is Hawk’s greatest project ever tackled in terms of size and budget.

In an exclusive interview with PopCulture.com via telephone, Hawk admits the six-episode series will feature a much more raw look at the emotional toll renovations like this take on the 37-year-old. But what made her want to take on the project in the first place? According to the entrepreneur and mom-of-two, there were a “lot of variables” that were part of her decision in taking on the massive mansion.

“There were a lot of things happening at the time that I made this decision, and the company [Two Chicks & a Hammer) was changing a lot. My sister and my sister-in-law had both departed from the company and there were a lot of decisions that I had made, that I was making, that just wasn’t supported,” she told PopCulture. “There were decisions that weren’t in the best interest of the company and so I was doing this all while I was doing a six-month kind of consulting, like management training, but really like business therapy almost.”

Hawk recalls reflecting on the moment, asking herself if she had been “doing the right thing” for herself. “[I was] in this place where I was like, ‘Am I doing the right thing? Have I been doing the right thing? What is the right thing? Do I need to be doing something different?’ And then this project was kind of in the mix during that time, and it probably isn’t one that was a reasonable buy, and it definitely was not supported, but going down that road, and really wanting to see it while there’s a right way [was a big reason].”

Stating how it wasn’t an “I told you so” kind of challenge, Hawk says it was more about making the “right decisions,” and more of a “traditional path to the right decision” with “some validation.” She adds, additionally it was all about “working it out in a 1.2 million dollar project,” which is also “never the best place to work that out.”

With the project being a very raw one for Hawk, audiences will see there is a recorded part of the renovations that finds her losing her “s—t” in the car, a moment she told PopCulture about earlier this year when detailing the “high-intensity” spinoff series. As cameras follow her everyone, Hawk tells us ahead of Tuesday’s premiere that all she needed was a moment to collect herself but didn’t realize the mic and camera were still on her. 

“I just needed a minute where it didn’t show like I was on display, I think. Because it becomes a bigger world when everything is for the camera,” she admitted. “And nothing I was doing at that time was for the camera. I was losing it. So that they actually have the footage, like, I don’t mind that people are going to see that. I honestly don’t remember all that was said or done during that cut. I’ve only seen the first cut [like the audience], so it’ll be interesting how much of it they actually use. But, again, it was more just in the moment — the big picture, if I did it, if I said it if I wore it, whatever, I’m comfortable owning it. I just needed what I thought was a private moment. There are no private moments anymore.”

Good Bones: Risky Business premieres Tuesday, Sept. 6, at 9 p.m. ET/PT on HGTV and discovery+. For more with Mina Starsiak Hawk and all things HGTV, stick to PopCulture.com for the latest.