Tour Taniya Nayak and Drew Lachey’s Season 7 ‘Rock the Block’ Home

After making a name for herself in the hospitality world and going toe-to-toe with fellow Battle on the Beach mentor Ty Pennington, Boston-based designer Taniya Nayak was ready to make her own gamble at the biggest table in renovation competition. “I designed restaurants for 20 years. I’d love to bring that hospitality restaurant energy into this space,” she said.

She tried her luck in Vegas with Drew Lachey, who first stepped into the spotlight as a member of 98 Degrees, then spent 15 years learning the nuts and bolts of renovation and design. “This is the best of both worlds,” he told Taniya. “I can do what I do, you do what you do, and then we can overlap [with] our own little yin and yang.”

“The one thing that I think makes this dynamic of the two of us really cool and special is … He brings the livable to it and … I’m bringing the design aesthetic, which is bringing the luxe — that Las Vegas luxe! — and so the pairing together is going to be epic," said Taniya.

For the seventh season of Rock the Block, Ty's venue is glitzier than ever before. Gathering in Las Vegas to renovate the biggest single-story homes ever featured on the show — more than 5,000 square feet of interior space and super-sized proportions — four teams have $275,000 each and seven weeks to push their properties’ appraisal values as high as possible. Wins along the way come with a choice: Spend $3,000 in prize money on the next week’s work or add $1,000 to the all-important final-appraisal figure.

The guest list? Even glitzier. HGTV pros are paired up with celebrities. Why the Heck Did I Buy This House? host Kim Wolfe comes to play with her Survivor-foe-turned-bestie Chelsea Meissner. Renovation Resort's Scott McGillivray rolls the dice with singer, television personality and rental designer Brooke Hogan. Last but not least, Good Bones star Mina Starsiak Hawk partners with Super Bowl-winning tight end Vernon Davis. Like Vegas’ famous late-night wedding chapels (and poker tables), this competition is all about unexpected pairs.

Confessing she usually has an aversion to color, Taniya was prepared to take a big swing in the principal bedroom. When in Vegas, right? Building on Drew’s fondness for blue, she committed to her first-ever color-drenching project, swathing the space in rich, textural wallpaper with matching floor-to-ceiling drapes for the French doors. She then added value by designing a wall-spanning fluted feature and a custom headboard upholstered in opulent leopard fabric (an investment of $3,750). “This fabric, by the way, was a splurge,” she told Drew. “I’m not going to tell you how much. Just know it’s going to work, and it’s going to win.”

For the wall opposite the bed, Taniya incorporated a pale fireplace to give the eye a break from the room’s all-enveloping blue. A wide wooden “mantelpiece” above the feature extends to become the desktop beneath a series of floating shelves on the right side of the room, creating a horizontality that contrasts with the floor-to-ceiling fireplace surround. “I guarantee nobody’s going to do what we’re doing,” Drew said.

The practical side of Drew had a lot to say about tinkering with the bath’s admittedly tricky layout: “You start moving plumbing, you start moving drains, you start getting into lots of extra time; lots of extra money.” He and Taniya opted instead to create an expansive, glassless room within the room that felt “like some of these resorts on the Strip without being so specific and gaudy,” as Taniya put it. They chose a sculptural tub and dramatically veined stone to make the zone feel like a penthouse suite, then framed the space with a showstopping arch.

Taniya and Drew chose sleek tiles in warm, neutral stone to create a sophisticated contrast with their minimalistic arch, then embedded LEDs in the shower niche to add functionality and a rich glow. That’s the kind of hospitality-pro move Taniya hoped to deploy throughout the home. “I always feel like there’s that whimsy of people going out to dinner and wishing they could take some of that and put it into their homes,” she explained, “but I also like it to have longevity to it. I don’t want it to be too trendy.”

Taniya wasn’t kidding when she said she would swing for the fences as she finished this suite. Hand-finished tiles in a vertical soldier stack complement the larger rectangular tiles in the wet room, while fluted wood flows across a massive wall-to-wall double vanity. The oxidized sconces flanking each mirror complement the sleek black upper cabinet between the sinks and the French doors Taniya and Drew added to provide direct access to the outdoors.

Nixing the kooky rotunda that stole space from surrounding rooms gave Drew and Taniya more square footage for their closet, which they then outfitted with stylish, two-tone cabinetry … to a point. They sidestepped the mistake of taking tiered shelving all the way up to the ceiling: “I don’t want to waste the money for shelves that no one can ever access,” Taniya said. A tall, slim island provides accessible storage without cramping the room or necessitating a ladder.

Presented with the design challenge of incorporating rich, red Moroccan tile in their home, Taniya and Drew were not keen on reconsidering the palettes they’d developed in the bedroom and bath suite. Instead, they played their wild card as a hint of character in the closet’s vanity area. Against the cabinetry’s white oak and walnut stains, the installation reads like the interior of a jewel box.

Fresh from work on their own Vegas real-estate project, the iconic design duo Lisa Vanderpump and Nick Alain stopped by the block to render a verdict on the contenders’ first week of work. The color-drenched bedroom divided them: “If you’re a blue person, you love it; if not, you’re in trouble,” Nick mused. The fabric and headboard earned their approval, but they missed nightstands that would have offered a landing spot on either side of the bed. Their adoration of the ultra-luxe bathroom, however, was unanimous: “We loved the doors leading out [from] the bathroom, that made it feel really special — and the open shower, it was really beautifully done,” Lisa said. They also appreciated that Taniya and Drew were able to turn their design-challenge element into a sophisticated pop of color for the closet.

Tasked with plotting out their home’s first-impression spaces — that is, the foyer, den and great room, an expanse that totaled a whopping 950 square feet — Team Nayak-Lachey decided to bet big on sliders that optimized their home’s uninterrupted view (an $8,160 budget commitment) and a brass mantel ($3,000) framed in travertine and charcoal-toned microcement that would anchor their gathering space.

“The dark moodiness here is really going to bring some continuity [from] the foyer into here and then the speakeasy, so they’re all going to work in concert together,” Drew said. Oh, did we mention that? The Vegas-worthy, one-of-a-kind secret at the heart of this house is …

Taniya flexed her hospitality-pro muscles once more and designed a steel blue, grasscloth-and-molding-accented wine wall that opens into a hidden bar (via the central wine rack, which doubles as a door handle). “This house is going to be worth well over $2 million when we’re done, which means someone buying in this area is going to want something really special,” Taniya reasoned.

Drew was with her: “A speakeasy is a cool, unique way to reimagine a typical entertaining space.”

Orchestrating this reveal was the most important part of the second week’s work for Taniya. “It’s what I do with my business: I do restaurants, I do bars, so it’s personal on that level,” she said. “I want this win so badly my heart’s racing just thinking about it!” The spectacular, two-tone marble floor ($6,450) that begins at the wine wall outside the den carries into this opulent space, where Drew and Taniya invested serious sweat equity to install the paneling ($4,920) and dark grasscloth wallpaper ($2,190) above it and across the ceiling. The black disco ball above the magnificent circular bar was $680 — and worth every penny.

“You could add a bar to a space; sure, that’ll add value. You can add a wine room to a space and that’ll add value,” Taniya said. “I think the element of surprise — it gets your emotions going.”

“Every house needs a signature moment. You know when you’re like, ‘Oh, remember the house with the …’” Drew noted. “This is the house with the speakeasy.”

When you want the final word on how to introduce a winning Rock the Block project, you invite Luxe for Less host Michel Smith Boyd — the competition’s only multiple-season winner — to render a verdict. His first impression was an excellent one: “There’s a real sense of entry here in this foyer. I kind of like that,” he said. He also loved the mix of materials in the great room, though he confessed to feeling more of the home’s “luxe” vibe than its “livable” elements. When it came to the speakeasy, however, he was all in: “Holy crap! Oh, Ty, come on!”

“Y’all, you got me. You got me so frickin' good,” he told Taniya and Drew. “That’s the best speakeasy I’ve seen on the block. The millwork was so good, it was completely hidden! And when we walked in, I was transported to Casablanca.”

Taniya had been waiting for weeks to put her restaurant background to work in the kitchen, and she was ready with heavy metal on Day 1: “What if we go brass hood?”

“That’s gonna be like a goat. It’s going to eat budget,” Drew replied.

“It’s gonna be the GOAT hood because it’s gonna be the greatest-of-all-time hood!” Taniya countered.

They were both correct, as the massive antique piece Taniya found cost an eye-watering $9,390, but it was in fact the showstopper she intended it to be. “It’s the crown jewel of this kitchen. I have been wanting to do this for ever, [and] today is the day,” she said.

"This bouncing off of the fireplace surround is really going to kind of just fuse the two spaces together," Drew agreed.

Taniya’s extra-tall brass hood had a ripple effect throughout the room, inspiring the addition of soaring upper cabinets and prompting Drew to suggest a library ladder to reach them. Stained to match the storage, that ladder ($380) is a breeze to perch on the cabinet rack — and it disappears into a slim space of its own when not in use. “Storage equals value, [and] now we have a beautiful but functional way to access that,” Taniya said. “This ladder does triple duty: one, it looks frickin' amazing, two, it adds value because it gives you access to the storage and, three, I forgot what that third one was.”

“Because we wanted it!” Drew replied.

Taniya’s loss (when Drew broke the news that, seriously, their budget couldn’t accommodate a restaurant-grade walk-in refrigerator that would easily cost $30,000) was a kitchen-storage gain, since the space they had set aside for that potential feature was now up for grabs once more. They opted to divide it into a dramatic second kitchen, equipped with yet another range and hood, more opulent stone counters, gorgeously underlit floating shelves and lower cabinets. After all that, they still had space for another zone.

That other zone? The only proper pantry on the block, with $4,270 in custom cabinetry. “I know you’re not excited about it and you wanted your walk-in freezer, [but] no one has ever said, ‘I would like less storage in my kitchen,’” Drew said.

“I feel like this is a smart move from an appraisal standpoint, and I feel like it’s going to appeal to a lot more people,” Taniya conceded. “The combination of our kitchen, the prep kitchen and this additional storage is going to give us the W with this one.”

Building on the “livable luxe” finishes and tones that characterize their foyer and great room, Drew and Taniya created an understated morning room to serve as a second dining area just beyond their eat-in kitchen (where the bull-nosed, double-curved countertop on the kitchen island claimed $10,670 of their budget). They focused on staging that emphasized the space’s versatility. Though this room lacks built-in features, it’s suitable for conversion to a homeowner’s particular needs.

After battling it out on not one but two seasons of Rock the Block (and scoring a kitchen win), Love It or List It designer Page Turner came to Vegas to weigh in on Season 7’s contenders. Drew and Taniya’s investment in that island paid off immediately: “Do we have an arched island with fluted wood?” Page marveled. “This is a massive island. I love how it curves so you can sit here and see who you’re talking to and so everybody’s part of the conversation.” The big-ticket range hood earned its keep as well. “This is a very elevated space,” Page continued. “I mean, this brass hood is gorgeous. And it goes all the way to the ceiling, oh! This is beautiful. Look at this, does it match the fireplace?!” The morning room paled in comparison to the zones beside it, but Page’s praise affirmed that Taniya and Drew’s strategic budgeting had succeeded almost everywhere.

The fourth week of competition brought Taniya and Drew to their multi-gen suite, a 250-square-foot space accessible via the home’s courtyard. They were required to create a kitchenette as part of their design, and they decided to overperform. “I want to prove to everybody that we can bring it on a low budget but really amp up the finishes and make it feel super homey, comfortable, moody, all the things,” Drew said.

The island he hand-built for $440 was central to that strategy. “We want people that come and stay in this room to feel the love and the investment of time that went into it. This is a story. This is something that was built out of love and attention to detail. You don’t get that with a prefab piece!”

Making clever use of tambour left over from their installations in the main house ($850), Taniya and Drew turned the material 90 degrees to the right and created a unique feature for their sitting-room niche. “I mean, horizontal [tambour] is cool, and we can frame around the whole perimeter and put light running through,” Taniya said.

“We’re in Las Vegas,” she continued. “I want to make sure we bring the Vegas charm — but not tacky, not wild and crazy, just something that’s livable.”

Taniya and Drew’s budget-conscious strategy for the multi-gen suite hinged on investing in installations that preserved its flexibility (such as the lighted wall behind the sofa niche and Drew’s versatile island beside the kitchenette). They then let staging suggest how users could put the rest of the space to work — and made the bold move of floating a sizable bed in the middle of the room.

Though the space’s relatively modest dimensions couldn’t accommodate an expansive bath, Taniya and Drew could suggest a dressing area behind the bed by building out its headboard — a clever move that also anchored the narrow nightstands flanking it — and creating a room divider to frame the blue bench they were tasked with using as part of a design challenge. The minimalistic move defined zones in the suite without making it feel cramped.

Drew’s shower-tiling project was well underway with ho-hum white tiles when Taniya interrupted him with these serene, green beauties ($1,410) that would help the suite pivot into color. “Our entire suite right now is beige, and I’m all for it — you know me, I love a neutral — but I thought maybe we could bring in something a little different,” she reasoned.

“Just so we’re clear, you want me to pull all this [installed] tile?” Drew asked.

“It’s not my fault you’re so good at tiling!” Taniya said. “You’re so fast, I was literally gone for 15 minutes and you’re almost done!”

“Flattery will get you everywhere,” Drew admitted.

The fourth week’s transformations faced a particularly exacting group of evaluators: The contestants were instructed to score each other’s spaces, and they did so with their own strategic choices fresh in their minds.

Mina and Vernon (above) appreciated how Drew and Taniya had invested in a larger, square window for the kitchenette. “I also like the closet doors painted a different color than the walls — it makes them an accent piece,” Mina said.

“Did you check out the handles?!” Vernon responded. “Ooh, the details!”

While they and the other teams noted the space felt more like a hotel room than an apartment (since the kitchen lacked a microwave and a refrigerator), “I’d stay here,” Mina said.

“I’d stay here, too!” Vernon responded. “Five nights! Wine and cheese!”

Taniya’s hospitality experience paid off at last, and she and Drew notched their first win.

The fifth week began in the laundry room. Drew and Taniya were determined to keep the momentum going from their first win. They designed a sleek, built-in stop-and-drop area that coaxed every bit of double-duty functionality out of cabinets, floating shelves and a wall-spanning storage bench.

Taniya and Drew outfitted their laundry room with ample countertops, cabinetry and shelves, of course, but they focused their enthusiasm on a feature to set themselves apart from the other homes’ chore zones. Technically an $840 investment, the canine bath they created was an added element of character as well. “I wish I had a dog-bathing station in my house!” Drew said. “This is going to be one of those luxury touches that makes this house feel like a home. This is built-in. This is comfort. This is convenience. This is adding value.”

Space was at a premium in the small bedroom Drew and Taniya styled as an office. They created a sophisticated, library-inspired space by turning the room into a jewel box of arched installations backed with more of the textural blue grass cloth they had used to color-drench the principal bedroom.

Having budgeted $25,000 for the laundry room, office and RV garage — a monstrous space with 18-foot ceilings — Drew and Taniya opted to create a wellness space that added value without limiting buyers’ options with added walls. They added a glass door to the rear wall to improve the space’s airflow, installed flooring and wall coverings, and invested in a sauna and sensory deprivation tank. Last but not least, they suspended professional-grade acrobatic silks from the soaring ceiling.

Summoned by the Vegas-themed silks in the RV garage, cabaret star (and original Real Housewives of New York City cast member) Luann de Lesseps came to the block to name the season’s fifth weekly winner. She both appreciated the many features Taniya and Drew packed into each of their spaces and felt that, in some cases, it was a bit too much. In the office, for example, she both appreciated the coziness and felt that the built-ins made the space a bit claustrophobic. In the laundry room, the dog station borrowed too much space that might have been used for more countertops. Despite its potentially overwhelming options, the RV garage wowed her: “I am so impressed by what’s going on here!”

The Week 6 backyard challenge entailed the integration of a plunge pool — and making the most of that appraisal-boosting windfall. Taniya and Drew leaned into the rectangular look of their 15' x 8' pool with tiered hardscaping that combined right angles in graduated concrete platforms and squared-off swaths of brick with organic elements (textural grass, loose natural stone and warm wood). Framed with Australian bottle trees that would create shade and privacy as they matured and flanked by loungers with a scalloped umbrella, the feature was a lucky strike that could change their whole game.

The extended loggia across the patio from the pool became an elevated entertaining space and alfresco dining room, thanks to a double-sided fireplace. An extra-long dining table serves as the centerpiece for dinner parties with spectacular mountain views, and an outdoor kitchen and casual dining area just beyond the roofline — and the indoor kitchen — make hosting a breeze. “To me, the backyard is where the family congregates,” Drew said. “This is where you have cookouts, you have parties, you have all the things.”

Speaking of the main bedroom, Drew and Taniya had another built-in feature in mind for its dedicated space. In keeping with Taniya’s professed love for “a good bougie-backyard moment,” they installed an outdoor shower that would benefit both swimmers just out of the pool and returning hikers coated in the area’s omnipresent dust. “In Ohio, we don’t really have outdoor showers — we have garden hoses,” Drew said. “This? This is Vegas! You need to have luxury to the max, you need to have everything at your fingertips.”

The handsome wooden hot tub Drew and Taniya purchased for their wellness-focused RV garage had, alas, needed several days to swell and become properly watertight. That made it unusable for the fifth week of competition — and just right for the sixth week, when it was ready for a place of honor on the patio (with more of that spectacular mountain view). Homeowners would be able to clean up in the outdoor shower, settle in for a soak at sunset, then get cozy on upholstered benches beneath the screened cedar pergola and enjoy the fire table as the stars became visible. What could be better?

As a Boston girl and Patriots fan, Taniya was thrilled to learn that two-time Super-Bowl-winning wide receiver (and luxury real-estate developer) Danny Amendola had come to Vegas to judge the block’s backyards. He pronounced their “fan-tastic” outdoor dining space “the best seating area we’ve seen so far” and praised the strategic move of situating the outdoor kitchen just beyond its indoor counterpart. But did that outdoor zone have to be quite so exposed to the sun? The hot tub, in turn, “is how I would start every morning,” he declared.

The dramatic slate tone Taniya and Drew chose for the majority of their exterior made it a standout on the block. Near-black roof shingles and sleek trusses, columns and beams offer dramatic curb appeal, as does the ultra-durable, thermally-modified wood siding ($8,960). “It just upgrades the entire feel of the exterior of the house, so that’s a trifecta,” Drew said. “You talk about what the judges want. They want functionality. They want improved value and they want creativity. I feel like this checks all three of those boxes.”

Taniya and Drew installed a wrought-iron, open-air door as an opening statement for their midcentury-modern home. “It’s a bold choice,” Taniya admitted. Of course, that was the point. “If a buyer is going to spend more than two million dollars for a house, they want a house that is one of one, not one of many.” Sleek, linear sconces on either side of the door echo its geometry and initiate the “livable luxe” style they developed in the rest of the home.

Finishing up their final space demanded a few pivots, as the fountain they’d ordered to anchor their courtyard didn’t arrive on time — and the pergola they planned to frame the office door and hide a pull-down movie screen blew past the remainder of their budget. They were still able to hide a projector in their fireplace’s chimney and install a screen ($780), and they subbed a sculptural table and planting for the fountain. “My movie dreams,” Drew said with satisfaction. “We’ve got our beautiful screen over here, it’s like our own little personal drive-[in] movie.”

Before the local appraisers arrived to render their verdicts, former locals (and current HGTV luminaries) Drew and Jonathan Scott stopped by to offer hints at how those appraisers might react. Drew was immediately impressed: “I have to be honest, this [exterior] is the most striking,” he said. “I love the bold choice of the dark exterior, the wood, stone, greenery — it all keeps it feeling warm and grounded, and the wrought iron door creates an inviting moment that hints at something special behind it.” Jonathan praised the ultimate entertaining home. “You would literally never have to go anywhere! You’ve got everything you need: spa, gym, lounging, secret bar…” If the appraisers echoed the Scotts’ awe, Drew and Taniya would claim the victors’ street sign.

The “livable luxe” theme came through loud and clear for Taniya and Drew’s competitors. “This gives me the most warm, cozy hug!” Kim exclaimed as she entered their home.

Vernon was equally impressed: “It’s one of the best design and renovation projects I’ve ever seen,” he said.

Mina, in turn, was rather surprised that the speakeasy hadn't taken top honors in the great room challenge. "The one we won?" Chelsea asked.