C4 offers DIY for lockdown Brits

Dick & Angel Strawbridge outside their French chateau

Commercially funded UK public broadcaster Channel 4 has greenlit a new series helping Brits on lockdown to find new and imaginative ways of solving DIY dilemmas.

Sean Doyle

Dick & Angel’s Make, Do & Mend (working title) is the first project to emerge from a collaboration between Scottish indies Two Rivers Media and Chateau Television.

Two Rivers was founded by former STV Productions chief Alan Clements at the start of 2019, initially with backing from Canada’s Kew Media Group. Two Rivers bailed out of the ailing company in January to become independent.

Chateau TV is the production shingle of Dick and Angel Strawbridge, who have become known to C4 viewers in recent years as the hosts of Escape to the Chateau, which follows them transforming an ageing property in rural France.

The new series will see the Strawbridges offering tips and tricks for families looking for solutions to DIY dilemmas while Britain is under lockdown during the coronavirus crisis.

The series was commissioned for Channel 4 by Sean Doyle, deputy head of features and formats, with Lizi Wootton exec producing for Two Rivers.

With France also under lockdown measures, the series will be filmed entirely by the Strawbridge family at their chateau. There they will communicate online with families from across the UK looking for practical advice and bespoke solutions for home projects of their own.