A team of builders who specialize in rebuilding and renovating rustic cabins and camps all over Vacationland are the focus of a new cable TV show debuting in January.
“Maine Cabin Masters” on DIY will show Maine-based builder Chase Morrill and his crew – including his sister, brother-in-law and best friend – as they work with camp owners to rebuild and restore vacation retreats.
The first episode will air Jan. 9 at 10 p.m. and the show is scheduled to last 10 episodes, each an hour long, according to publicists for DIY. Each episode shows a different rehab project.
The premiere episode follows Morrill’s crew as they take a seaplane to a small island off Bar Harbor where Mainers Rob and Candy Eaton own a dilapidated 1930s log cabin with no electricity or running water. Some logs are rotting. Morrill and his crew were given a $30,000 budget and six weeks to complete the project.
A trailer for the first season of the series shows the building crew demolishing walls and roofs, joking around with each other and revealing finished projects to delighted homeowners.
A pilot for the series aired in February and showed the renovation of a 1930s summer cottage on Webber Pond in Vassalboro owned by the family of the late Beverly Daggett, former president of the Maine State Senate.
An upcoming episode is described on DIY’s website as the renovation of “an off-the-grid camp for a family of city slickers.” But a rotted water tank threatens to shut the whole project down.
The show is one of several reality shows filmed in Maine over five years or so, focusing on unique aspects of the state’s life and culture. These include History’s “Down East Dickering,” about Mainers who buy and sell almost anything; Animal Planet’s “Cold River Cash,” about the state’s elver fishing industry; Discovery’s “American Loggers,” about a family logging business in Millinocket; and Animal Planet’s “North Woods Law,” which followed the Maine Warden Service.
None of the shows is still in production.
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