HGTV builds into a top cable network on foundation of no-frills shows

As hard as it may be to imagine, there was a time not so long ago when few Americans had ever heard the expression "man cave."

In 1994, PBS' trusty "This Old House" was the best known of a handful of home-improvement programs on the airwaves. The idea of HGTV, a 24-hour lifestyle network devoted to gardening, decorating, crafting and do-it-yourself renovations that launched that year, seemed ridiculously narrow, prompting the New York Times to wonder, "Is America ready for all-home TV?"

Now as HGTV closes in on its 20th anniversary, the question seems almost quaint: Once derided as "compost TV," it has become a top-10 cable network in prime time available in 96 million homes and part of a multimedia lifestyle brand that includes a magazine and website. Its ratings grew in tandem with the real estate market boom of the early aughts, arguably helping fuel the nation's lust for granite countertops and open-concept kitchens, and were only briefly dampened by the subprime mortgage crisis and Great Recession.

And while other networks have seen breakout real estate hits such as "Trading Spaces" and "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" quickly wear out their welcome with viewers, HGTV has built a lineup full of quiet, consistent performers most notably, the 15-year-old "House Hunters" franchise. The network's pleasantly formulaic programming, which includes "Property Brothers," "Flip or Flop" and "Fixer Upper," offers ever-so-slight variations on the same theme: people buying, renovating and selling property.

This reliability has made HGTV a favorite go-to destination for affluent, educated viewers, particularly women, unable to resist taking a voyeuristic glimpse into other people's domestic lives and engage in a bit of risk-free real estate speculation. Case in point: When Hillary Rodham Clinton was preparing to step down as secretary of State in 2012, she said she hoped to spend more time watching "Love It or List It." ("I find it very calming," she told the New York Times.)

In the process, the Knoxville, Tenn.-based network has also become a pop cultural touchstone, with its flagship series "House Hunters" inspiring drinking games, a "Jeopardy" question and jokes on "30 Rock" and "Saturday Night Live."

As Kathleen Finch, president of Scripps Networks Interactive Home Category, which includes HGTV and its sister channel DIY, puts it, "I think we're the guilty pleasure of a lot of intelligent people."

The network relies heavily on shows featuring duos of "real people" as opposed to trained TV hosts who are knowledgeable in real estate and also happen to look good on camera. The so-called Property Brothers, identical Canadian twins Drew and Jonathan Scott, have three shows with a fourth on the way and have become the de facto faces of HGTV as well as heartthrobs. (They made People magazine's "Sexiest Men Alive" list last year.) There's also Tarek and Christina El Moussa, the telegenic SoCal married couple featured in "Flip or Flop," and Chip and Joanna Gaines, the equally eye-pleasing husband-and-wife team on "Fixer Upper."

For many fans, the relationships are at least as intriguing as the real estate. As humorist and "Daily Show" contributor John Hodgman recently tweeted, "Every 'House Hunters International' could be subtitled 'What Are They Running From' or 'When Will They Divorce?'"

At some level, HGTV's appeal may have as much to do with its own pleasantly escapist offerings as with what's available elsewhere on the dial. Compared with the perpetually gloomy and increasingly partisan 24/7 news cycle and the dark, complicated storytelling associated with the current "Golden Age of TV," HGTV acts as a bit of much-needed counterprogramming, said Shawn Shimpach, an associate professor of film studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

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HGTV builds into a top cable network on foundation of no-frills shows