JOAN STEFFEND
Decorating Cents Star Talks About Career Changes and HGTV War Stories

Her long-running success on HGTV (in which she and her team transformed rooms in 400 homes) is all the more impressive when you remember that Steffend, one of the design world’s more recognizable personalities, had no design experience prior to HGTV.

You could say Steffend’s career was launched in the first grade, when she appeared on stage as a lightbulb in the school pageant. Plays, summer stock and a Warner Brothers Film Actors Workshop followed. She began to make her mark in television by anchoring the news in Duluth, Minn., and Minneapolis-St. Paul, where her work won a national Emmy and other industry awards.

In 1997 she became host of Decorating Cents and went on to also host high-profile HGTV specials including annual Christmas at the White House shows, Dream Homes and the Rose Bowl Parade. Before long, she was rubbing elbows with other TV icons when she made guest appearances on Oprah, Live with Regis and Kelly, The CBS Early Show, The Today Show and Entertainment Tonight.

Though Decorating Cents is still airing, it has ended filming. So Steffend is again in the midst of another career transition. While exploring new opportunities, she talked with Window Fashions about her career choices (including a new direction that is leading her down yet another evolving career path) and memorable moments on Decorating Cents:

How did your transition from TV news anchor to Decorating Cents happen?
“I had been working as a news anchor for a long time—well over a decade—when I took a new look at my life, and thought, ‘There’s got to be something more!’ I started dreaming of the kind of job that would suit me better and I came up with the idea that I wanted to do something creative, fun and optimistic that would benefit people. I always worried about the idea that I was making a living talking about so many negative things in the world, when I believed the world was a positive place.

“I spent at least a year expecting this fun thing to happen in my life, when I went to a book club meeting I had never been to before, and a woman who had hosted an early show on HGTV asked if anyone there was interested in hosting a show on the network, some kind of decorating show. Well, it didn’t automatically appeal to me, because the only decorating shows I knew until then were shows with massive budgets that I could never relate to. The woman told me it was a $500 budget show, and all of a sudden it became a lot more do-able! About three weeks later, I was on the set of Decorating Cents doing a show that was creative, fun, optimistic and that, hopefully, benefitted people.”

What are you currently doing?
“I’m currently working on quite a few projects, both in and out of the design field. My decorating buddy, Robb Whittlef (“Trash to Treasure” segments), and I have been working on a book that’s partly about design and partly about forgiving yourself for not living in a home that looks like a magazine. We call it The Imperfect Lifestyle.

“Decorating Cents is no longer in production, although there are 400 episodes still airing on HGTV. I’m doing a radio show in Minneapolis-St Paul, and working on some TV ideas in the arena of body-mind-spirit—with an emphasis on spirit! I guess it’s just another form of interior design. Its time has come!”

Can you tell us more about the body/mind/spirit focus?
“Body/mind/spirit to me is the knowledge that we are indivisible in those three areas. Typically, as a culture, we’ve been treating the body in the doctor’s office, the mind at school and the spirit in church. I believe that they are one, and we’d all be healthier in body/mind/spirit if we didn’t separate them. My sister lived with cancer for 20 years, and we spent a lot of time researching and living with new ways of healing and thinking. It opened my eyes to so many things that I’d love to share. I get the feeling people are hungry for more in their lives, and studying alternative healing, and alternative thinking, has filled me up in exciting ways!”

(Editor’s note: We’ve asked Joan to keep us posted on her career moves in the body/mind/spirit area.)

Getting back to Decorating Cents—what’s your favorite room makeover on that show?
“That’s a hard one. There are so many to love, but I think I’ll have to go with re-doing the Minnesota governor’s mansion during the reign of Jesse (The Body) Ventura. It was wild—$500 had to stretch around a massive lower level room that was stuck in the ’60s, complete with a bubble gum-pink sofa. Yikes! Designer Joan MacDowell pulled it off with gallons of red paint, yards of cream cotton duck, a fabulous cheetah print sheet, several dozen free cigar boxes and loads of time and creativity.

“That room nearly broke us, but when it was done, it was fabulous—complete with a faux rotunda painted on the ceiling. By the way, the governor never made it down there during the two long days we were there. Ultimately, I heard through the grapevine that he loved his new ‘smoking room.’ I hope it’s true.”

Biggest disaster on Decorating Cents:
“A room that we did for a news anchor friend of mine. He was a single guy at the time, and his kitchen wasn’t in great shape. We worked a really long, hot summer day, turning his kitchen into an Italian cucina. We were getting ready for our final shot when the set carpenter accidentally bumped up against the table. Well, we had had the bright idea of toasting with a bottle of red wine, and that bottle not only tipped, it seemed to explode—ALL OVER OUR NEWLY PAINTED AND REDECORATED KITCHEN! The wine was on the walls, the ceiling, the new chair covers, my suede shirt, everywhere! We had to go to work scrubbing and washing and raiding the homeowner’s closet for a shirt for me to wear. Ultimately, it all worked out fine, but boy, was that a long night.

“Over the course of the 10 years we did Decorating Cents, we also had to almost completely UN-do a makeover for a cranky guy. I’ve hot-glued myself to a kitchen tile. I thanked God for dropcloths when I spilled a gallon of red paint dangerously close to white Berber carpet. And then there was the time we almost set our makeover room on fire—don’t ask.”

Greatest success on Decorating Cents:
“Our greatest success on DC has to be the fact that the group of people who worked so long and so hard for 10 years ended up feeling like family. Sure, there was a disagreement here or there, but we worked harder and laughed harder than anyone has a right to. What a blessing.”

Biggest lesson learned from Decorating Cents:
“To look at things not for what they are, but for what they could be. We learned that lesson at least five to 10 times a show. If you can’t buy it on your budget—make it out of something you found on the curb, literally.”

Advice for designers:
“It would be arrogant for me to offer advice to the wonderful designers out there. I’m just a person who wanted to have fun, and who got a kick out of the creativity of design. One thing that became apparent to me, after working with 400 homeowners, is that we have a huge responsibility to create an environment that really serves the clients’ needs. The home they live in is like the clothes they wear. It reflects back to them who they are and who they want to be. It’s important work.”

Career advice:
“The only general career advice I ever give out, as my kids will attest, is to love what you do or do something else. Follow your passion.”

Sheri O’Meara is editor of Window Fashions. Reach her at sheri@gracemcnamarainc.com.