How Chip Gaines inspired the "HGTV husband"

Jezebel

Though Joanna Gaines is often the face of Magnolia, she and husband Chip have built the brand together. "She’s on the two cookbooks, the interior design book, and frequently their magazine," says Kelly Faircloth. "She’s the one with the star power, the 'modern farmhouse' Martha Stewart who can convince America that shiplap is chic. Chip, meanwhile, is the supportive muscle, presiding over the renovation itself, beginning with the dusty, dirty slate-clearing of 'Demo Day,' where they gut the existing space. He plays this role as the classic American sitcom dad, keeping up a steady stream of jokey hollering and antics and once, memorably, eating a cockroach. He revels in the destruction of Demo Day; he thinks avocado toast is gross and told Joanna he didn’t want a menu full of 'frou-frou' food at their breakfast joint. This is their schtick: Joanna shakes her head, laughs it off, and puts the avocado toast on the menu. But despite their comical dynamic, Chip is an inextricable part of the show’s formula, and together they’ve provided a model for HGTV to replicate endlessly, even as they’ve spun off into their own multimedia and lifestyle juggernaut: down-home general contractor husband, aspirational designer wife. They smile in the promotional imagery, leaning together like a matched set of bookends. She pulls him toward the stylish stuff they can make audiences want on a mass scale; he helps maintain their aura of accessibility."