'Brady Bunch' Star Christopher Knight Didn't Give Up Until He Found 'The Brady Bunch' House's Original Paint Color

From House Beautiful

After 15 years, The Brady Bunch kids reunited for HGTV’s A Very Brady Renovation, and its 90-minute premiere left a lot to unpack. Titled “Honey, We’re Home,” the first episode tackles the famous exterior and the heart of the home—living room, dining room, and iconic staircase—with The Property Brothers Drew and Jonathan Scott taking the lead. Maureen McCormick (Marcia), Susan Olsen (Cindy), and Christopher Knight (Peter) also provided man power and consultation with their one-of-a-kind memories.

If you love watching home demolitions to a Brady Bunch soundtrack—just picture it for a second—this show is for you.

The Brady Bunch kids see the Studio City home for the first time ever.

In August 2018, HGTV officially bought The Brady Bunch house with one goal in mind: To transform it into the ‘70s masterpiece America knows and loves. Of course, the renovation of the ranch-style home couldn’t have been done without the six Brady Bunch kids and after working out schedule logistics, all of them, along with eight HGTV stars, began the project on November 1, 2018.

But before knocking down walls, The Brady Bunch kids gathered together in front of the famous Studio City home—whose façade was used in the ‘70s sitcom—and looked at it for the first time ever. “Just seeing this is a flood of memories,” Barry Williams said. “Even though we didn’t spend our time here, but between what this represents and what we’ve all been through, it’s going to be quite a ride.”

Eve Plumb (Jan) points out that it’s the first time everyone’s been together without their Brady Bunch parents, Robert Reed (Mike), Florence Henderson (Carol), and the family’s housekeeper, Ann B. Davis (Alice). The six share an emotional moment reflecting on past Brady Bunch projects with all nine cast members.

The Brady Bunch house gets a 2,000-square-foot addition.

HGTV viewers know all too well that day one is demo day, and A Very Brady Renovation starts off with a bang, with the entire crew pulling down an awning to make way for the home’s new addition in the back.

Since there are 15 different Brady spaces to recreate in 9,000 work hours over six months, the limited TV series assigned two leaders to oversee the ambitious project: Design expert-slash-build-manager Dylan Eastman and contractor Dave Clark. The two quickly realize that the existing house—which is a split level—is too small to fit all the rooms and an addition must be added using space from the backyard that won’t change the street view.

The 2,000-square-foot home will include the family room and kitchen on the lower level and the boys’ room, girls’ room, and a Jack-and-Jill bathroom on the upper level. It's essential to build it all without adding anymore height, which would alter the home’s well-known front.

There’s a Brady Command Center.

That’s right, HGTV went the extra mile by renting the house next door to serve as the Brady Command Center for the project. When the designers, builders, and Brady kids need to plan and plot, they can head to the Command Center to reference a house model, blueprints, and images and videos from the show.

The Property Brothers put extra effort toward perfecting the Brady house’s interior.

The Brady Bunch house was taken down to the studs (literally!) and then Good Bones’ Mina Starsiak and Karen Laine started building the addition with a new foundation and frame before the Property Brothers started creating the interior from scratch.

Drew and Jonathan told House Beautiful about the process of recreating the iconic staircase in the home, which resulted in it only having 11 stairs instead of 12. The duo also shared with us how they built the stone wall feature, and how Chris helped the team with his tech contacts to rebuild the horse statue.

There was also special attention to detail in finding a matching dining room table set and the floral couch—highlighting the issue of creating rooms with furnishings and décor that are decades old and aren’t as easy to get a hold of. But designer Dylan gets the task done in an amazing way with the help of Maureen and Susan. (You'll have to watch to see what, exactly, I mean.)

Christopher Knight is instrumental in recreating the Brady house’s exterior.

For the Studio City home’s exterior, the Property Brothers needed to create a window on the right side, close off a window on the left side, add trees and bushes to match the 1969 landscaping, and lastly, remove a wall that was added to keep fans at bay. Plus, find the original Brady beige paint color—and that’s where Chris came in.

The task flowed through a number of different hands: first assigned to the Brothers, and then challenging Hidden Potential star Jasmine Roth, who felt the pressure, but ultimately, it was Chris who did a bit of detective work and of course, swatching to find the correct paint color.

When it was time to cover up the window on the right side of the home, which didn’t appear in the show, Chris helped break it apart. When a section of it wouldn’t budge, Drew suggested throwing a hammer through it. The Brady kid instead opted for a huge rock, saying, “'Cause Mom always said 'don’t play ball in the house,' she never said nothing about rocks.”

A Very Brady Renovation had its first reveal, and it left everyone speechless.

Drew and Jonathan have welcomed countless of homeowners into their new spaces but opening the doors for the Brady kids for the first reveal was unlike any other experience—the six actors were blown away by the initial transformation.

“It’s a strange place between fiction and reality,” Chris said with Mike Lookinland (Peter) adding, “The attention to detail has no limit in this place.”

“I think Florence and Bob would be very proud and amazed. Ann, as well, because it’s exactly how it looked when we were shooting,” Eve commented.

“I feel like they’re all here with us,” Maureen agreed.

Catch new episodes of A Very Brady Renovation on Mondays at 9 p.m. ET on HGTV.

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