Ever since Tiffany Brooks was crowned the winner of Design Star in 2013, her name (and career) has skyrocketed to fame. And for good reason! The interior designer has a way with classic home design that she inevitably always adds her own personal twist to. As much as we love her unique take on traditional styles, we’re the first to admit that there’s so much more to Tiffany than meets the eye. Intrigued? Keep reading for eight things you might not have known about the Chicago-based HGTV star.

Her career started as a property manager staging homes.

Before becoming a well-known HGTV host, Tiffany worked at an apartment complex where she staged the homes. It was while working there that Tiffany began to really hone her design style. And, after her boss witnessed her skill in person, they submitted one of her designs to the CAMMEs—which is “like the Grammys for the Chicagoland Apartment Association,” Tiffany said in an interview with Washington Gas. Upon submission, her boss made her a bet: If she won, she had to pursue a career in interior design. And, lo and behold, she did just that.

She owns her own interior design firm.

Following her CAMMEs win in 2007, Tiffany set out to become an interior designer. Her first interior design firm was You and Your Decor, which eventually became Tiffany Brooks Interiors. It was through her work with her firm that she landed on HGTV's radar, ultimately getting cast in the 2013 season of Design Star. To this day, her firm focuses on creating lasting relationships with its clients, ensuring they fall in love with their updated space.

Tiffany was named as part of Architectural Digest’s AD100 List.

While Tiffany’s design style is classic, her results are anything but boring. It’s because of this that Architectural Digest not only named her on their highly respected AD100 list in 2020 but also as one of their 20 Most Famous Interior Designers Working Today.

She loves to design with budget in mind.

Back when she was designing her life-changing apartment models, Tiffany was given a $3,000 budget and came in under that goal. Since then, she’s focused on creating high-quality spaces without the typical high-cost budgets. It’s such a focus for her, in fact, that one of her FAQs on her interior design firm’s site revolves around the misconception that one must be rich to afford interior design.

She’s an expert organizer.

In an interview with Huffington Post, Tiffany shared that her design superpower is organization. “It’s so boring, isn’t it?” she asked. “I have a creative mind as well as a business mind. Having that, I can dream it up, but to install it and implement it, you need that organization and you need those business skills to make things work.”

She’s been on a few HGTV shows and is debuting a new series in April 2021.

After winning Design Star, Tiffany went on to host The Most Embarrassing Rooms in America (which went off air). Since then, she’s been the host and designer of Smart Home since 2016, and appeared on Design at Your Door and, most recently, Rock the Block. Now, Tiffany (and HGTV) fans have another show to look forward to. $50K Three Ways—a series that illustrates the many ways $50K can go to good use in the process of home design—is set to debut on Monday, April 26 on HGTV at 8 p.m. ET, as well as on discovery+.

She married her high school sweetheart.

Tiffany met her husband, Dante Brooks, in high school. The sweethearts have ridden the wild ride of Tiffany’s budding fame, all while keeping their relationship quite hidden from the public eye. That said, the couple has a son, Ayden Brooks, who regularly makes appearances on Tiffany’s Instagram feed.

She lives with Type 1 Diabetes.

Tiffany has lived with diabetes since she was 6 years old. The disease threatened her pregnancy and she actually had to deliver her son four weeks prematurely. Following his birth, her kidneys began to fail and her life flashed before her eyes. Thankfully, her brother was her “perfect fit” and he donated a kidney to help save her life.

Having lived with diabetes for decades, Tiffany has focused more heavily on her health in recent years, shedding weight and beaming from the inside out in the process.