I was very sad to see the news that the jovial, charismatic designer from TLC's "Trading Spaces" died of a heart attack on Friday; he was 72. CNN NEWS Story. I loved Frank. He may not have been my favorite designer but he was certainly my favorite personality on that show.
He was my favorite. I didn't always like his designs, but he was never temperamental or mean to anyone and he never did bizarre or stupid things to the rooms he worked on. Several years ago I attempted a weird fanfic crossover between Trading Spaces and Voyager (Q's way of thanking Janeway for looking after Junior; he thought the ship was boring so he plucked several Trading Spaces designers out of the 20th century to give it a makeover). This was one NaNoWriMo project that never got finished due to writer's block and lack of adequate preparation (as in it had been too long since I watched the episodes and was having trouble writing myself out of a couple of annoying corners). But if it had, Janeway would have discovered that her ready room had been redone by Frank. Yes, it would have included a chicken.
^That's why I really liked Frank. I may not have liked all of this designs but it was simply because it wasn't my taste. He wasn't out to try something just to be a dick about it (*cough*Hildi & Doug); he seemed to really want to make the person happy and he wanted to make the couple working on it happy. He had a very fatherly way about him, and a great sense of humor, which just made people like him.
Frank had a side business selling wonderful crafting kits. My Mother bought a couple and each one had a personal note and a little cartoon doodle included, just because he wanted to make each item special ...