A Dresden man has taken his home building talents to the small-screen this year.
Dave Depencier is the star of the show Reno My Reno on the Cottage Life Network.
Depencier told the Sydenham Current the show is a 13 episode series for this first season, and he hopes it becomes an annual series.
“Hopefully it goes well and everyone likes it and we have a season 2,” Depencier said.
“Basically what it is, I go into people’s cottages and people have basically screwed something up. They have either tried to either redo or renovate or reconstruct an area. Whether it’s a kitchen, living room, sun room, or whatever. They have just thrown the towel in and shut ‘er down because they ran into a roadblock or they have just had enough. So I come in and I basically assess what they have done, obviously point out where they have kinda went wrong. Than I come up with an idea about how to create a great space for them.”
Depencier said if it’s a husband and wife for example, and the husband is responsible for the mess, I will keep the husband, if that’s the case, it’s not always the case because I have had two women work with me as well,” he said.
“I will keep one of them and send the other one away for a couple days. First I will have some fun with them, myself and my team sort of poke at what have done. We will actually take the time and teach them how to do things properly. Show them how to do certain items, where they went wrong, how to prevent that next time and then I actually try to pick out a couple of little projects for them to do after I show them how to do some things.”
Depencier added: “At the end, they can feel like they’ve been a good part of what we have done at the end when we reveal the space to the other half.”
Depencier said it’s a great concept because they get to see how hard we work and the effort we put into getting where we are at.
“They play a great role in it,” he said. “It’s a great way for them to appreciate what we do and they learn a lot along the way. It is a lot of fun along the way.”
From being heavily involved in the Chatham-Kent Home Builders Association, Depencier said he got tipped off that a production company had made an Ontario-wide casting call, and thought this might be a decent fit.
“So we made contact and obviously I had to provide them with some things and then at the end of the day, it probably took a good year and a half, maybe close to two years by the time it got to the point where they had a show approved by a network,” he said.
“Then I had to go audition for the part once it got to that stage. The network who selects the talent for the show thought I would be a great fit and wanted me to host it. It’s been an awesome experience and I really enjoyed it.”
Depencier said he’s happy that the show reflects what he normally likes to do for clients.
“I love to create and when clients put faith in my vision, but on the show it is just a spin off of that. They basically hand me the project and say ‘tell us what you are doing and tell us what you need.’ It’s very true to me which is what I’m thankful for because it’s not scripted, it’s not ‘here is what you are going to do’.”
Depencier said he enjoys watching the reaction of the clients afterwards.
“You hope they are going to like it but it’s very unique in that aspect. To see their reaction when you’re done makes it all worth while,” he said.
Where were all of these episodes completed?
Depencier said the shows were all completed in a three hour radius from the Ottawa area, which is where the production company is based out of.
The show began airing in June on Cottage Life TV, which is part of The Cottage Life Network. It is available on Shaw, Rogers, Cogeco, Bell and online.
It airs every Thursday at 9:30pm.
– Photo credit: Reno My Reno
