StarBulletin.com

Coming clean


By

POSTED: Friday, January 30, 2009

In the search for the messiest home in the nation, the Jones house in Aina Haina is definitely a contender.

Niecy Nash, host of the Style Network's “;Clean House,”; surveyed the home of Aina Jones and her family last week and gave it her official seal of disorder.

The house is stacked with bins of books. Toys cover the floor. The dining table has become a storage facility. The pantry is filled with old eats, and all the rooms are overstuffed, having lost their original purpose as places of comfort and relaxation.

The family has five cars—but can't find the keys to two of them.

“;They have everything in that house, and it's packed,”; said Nash. “;It's what I'd call multigenerational clutter. The grandmother, mother and her kids are contributing in their own way.”;

The Jones home is to be part of a series of special episodes called “;Clean House: The Search for the Messiest Home in the Country.”; The crew has been to California, Maryland and North Carolina to find messy homes in need of transformation.

“;These are the most outrageous families and chaotic homes that we've ever introduced,”; said Style Network President Salaam Coleman.

The special episodes are an extension of the usual “;Clean House”; formula, wherein Nash sweeps through a family's home, motivating them to remove all their clutter. All the discarded items are sold in a yard sale where the proceeds are used to remodel the home. “;Clean House”; matches up to $1,000.

The Jones' home was nominated as the nation's messiest by Aina Jones' friend Jennifer Cremmer.

“;I didn't want to be on the show, but I knew I needed help,”; Jones said.

As is usual for a “;Clean House”; family, the Joneses have furniture, artwork and interesting artifacts buried beneath the household clutter.

“;Obviously, they have way too much stuff,”; show designer Mark Brunetz said. “;Each space needs to be clearly defined. The kids are sleeping in the family room or on the opium bed in the living room. The family room should be a space where they can gather. The dining room is a place where they can eat at a table. We need to bring functionality back to the rooms.”;

But getting the family to give things up is a tremendous feat that takes some arm-twisting. Eventually, though, homeowners see the light. Aina and her two adult sons, for example, agreed to sell three of their five cars.

“;We look for things that they haven't been used in quite some time; that's automatically considered junk, excess or clutter,”; Nash said. “;They may be holding onto certain things because of emotional reasons. We need to get rid of those things so that they can let go and deal with their feelings instead of crowding them out.

“;Clutter is an expression of an inward thing,”; Nash added. “; If we can get to the inward cause, we can clean the outward.”;