Vardon Family

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition
The Vardon Family
Recap By J.G. Bird
November 7th

Judy and Larry Vardon are childhood sweethearts, and they’ve been married twenty years. They live a happy, but not necessarily simple life with their two sons in Oak Park, Michigan. Their youngest is twelve-year old Lance, born blind and recently diagnosed autistic. Their first child, Stefen, has spent all his life as intermediary to the hearing world for his deaf parents, and as an additional caretaker for his younger brother. The fourteen-year old is such a responsible young man, he is still thinking in terms of meeting the needs of his family first, despite his dreams of a college-bound future.

The arrival at the Vardon house can’t fully rely on the trusty megaphone tactics. An operator-assisted relay call to the household’s TTY (tele-typewriter device tied into the standard phone system) and a highway-construction display screen is set right outside the house. As usual, a fresh-faced family emerges. Our design team is able to leap their first hurdle in communicating with the family. A great deal of time is spent out of the first hour of the show to introduce and pinpoint the needs of the Vardon’s blind and autistic son. Lance’s extraordinary personality is noted over and over again by the designers’ individually-taped comments, but the audience has to take it on faith, because the footage on Lance is limited in the first hour. Maybe, as an indicator of how grand a job the design team does, it’s Lance’s vocal responses, much more noticeable in the second hour, during the reveal, which touch the heart. The designers, particularly, Paige, Preston and Ty, take the time to note the original layout of his room, his interests, and to be taught how Lance relates to his surroundings. Constance, Michael and Paul are glad to focus on most everything else to be done.

The demolition is very sporadic. There’s drywall getting holes knocked into it, mostly. Of course it’s been a while, in the line-up of episodes, when it is just a matter of remodel not complete tear-down and rebuild. Coming up with the idea to use cue cards on the demolition video to the family is a fun twist on the usual Ty hijinks. Holding up cards like, “Boom,” and “Crash” was a good-humored way to tackle it.

Expansion is only achieved through fully opening up the basement, as well as providing an additional (albeit, emergency) exit, and the addition of a foyer and front porch across the entire front of the house. The lot is small and very closely spaced to a neighboring house. The above ground pool is removed, in favor of a small specialty pool with pool cover. Open lofted ceilings and the removal of several interior walls provide superior sight lines across their new great room.

Dare I forget the “Bigfoot” (monster truck) appearance? It is one way to demolish discarded furniture. Was this a moratorium on ugly plaid furniture and cheaply made bureaus? A tip of the hat to Detroit…? Why a Bigfoot segment? They certainly went “BIG” for visuals in the video segments being forwarded to the Vardon’s.

The contractors Adam Becker and Adam Heffman of Fairway Construction get the record in all the builds to date no one’s done it faster - keys supplied to Ty 36 hours in advance. They and their crew received little attention otherwise. One attempt came off a bit odd: One of the Adams breaks into simple rap, accompanied by Ty. “What was that, that just happened?” Ty quips in the next shot. (Uh, yeah, that was my question too, Ty!)


Lance’s bed ”womb” design is overseen by specialists in autism. Various tactile sensory wall items, storage and activity areas are incorporated, including the safety features for the room.

One of the main additions is a small disk-shaped tracking device that can be sewn into Lance’s pajamas. A demonstration of this item from Project Lifesaver seems in order. Preston is the easy target for Ty’s practical joke – Ty slips the tracking device into Preston’s back pocket and sends him into town for a patty melt. Then the police zero right-in on his location at the diner.

There’s a new twist on Ty’s megaphone madness – A megaphone ending – Ty, of course, announcing point-blank, “we have 1 more hour of television!”

At the opening of our second hour, a sculptured Styrofoam/mesh/stucco façade has now been added as a doorway focal point above the cedar porch.

Lime and tangerine walls in the basement – may sound awful, but come off quite joyous. It now incorporates three areas (the previous laundry hook ups moved to upstairs, at Judy’s request). First the play area for Lance: Bookshelves for his Braille books, a launch into a ballpit, and a tunnel cubbyhole including colored florescent and blacklight features. Next, a new craft area for mom – dress form, shelving and organization galore, and more importantly, a video monitor, one of many throughout the house, for keeping track of Lance. Last is the bedroom for Stefen.

One summer that Stefan spent in Australia has inspired the design of a backlit headboard cut to the profile of Ayers Rock. The lighting is meant to mimic sunset at this Central Australian landmark. Paul has amazing ability in doing up a “kid’s” room. It’s been shown time and again. The actual car hood-shaded light fixture over the study desk is balanced by the Jeep grill with headlights on a fader switch, attached to the ceiling. The bedspread is unique and classy done up in a bright red with a piping design like rock strata or a sand-swept look. Stefan’s souvenirs from Australia make up most of the finishing touches.

Paul is also responsible for building a tall, two-swing, swing set. Wind chimes on the swing set are an emotional and sensory highlight for Lance.

The most emotional points for Larry, the dad, come in the reveal of the basement playroom for Lance – Larry notes how he’s felt he could never provide all the items Lance really needed, now here they are. Then, Larry walking into his own shed full of Craftsman tools! Yeah, that’s a dream for the ultimate tinkerer and Detroit assembly-line worker. The reveal of the parent’s master suite takes a back seat to these moments, truly. Never could you care less about the remodel of the bathrooms! Plus, one more bit of sweetness: The romantic choice of Mackinack Island’s Grand Hotel for the Vardon’s vacation is based on the newlywed couple visiting it, but unable to spend the money to stay there for a honeymoon. (Anyone other than me remember the turn-of-the Century hotel as the locale in the 1980 movie, Somewhere In Time?)

Since design takes a back seat to function and technology for this house, it’s appropriate that a 100 amp generator is provided. The technology explained to the family upon their return is extensive. Exterior door alarms are wired to strobes and a motor to shake the parents’ bed to alert them if Lance is wandering in the night. Red strobe-light fire alarms and keypad door security are also installed. Only noted once, but fantastic technology for this family is the Braille typewriter hooked up to the computer which can read the Braille and allow the other family members to reply back in Braille. I understand that SBC Communications Inc., NXI, and MCI partner with a company called, HITEC Group International, bringing together this system and all the technological accommodations in the house.

One other thing I thought significant to mention, the Styrofoam exterior and the water fountain feature outside creates a level of white noise that certainly would help in deterring Lance from hearing street noises outside, which had been one source of his random wandering. I think, as expected, Lance loves his new swing, and we can imagine all the grand times he’ll spend with the family in the improved areas of the house.

Accompanied by actress Marlee Matlin, the head of Starkey Hearing Foundation presents a $50,000 scholarship to Stefan at the overwhelmingly tearful ending.