Grand Designs viewers have expressed their disbelief over a ‘gloriously mad’ project that has never been attempted before.

Airing since 1999, the Channel 4 series presented by Kevin McCloud follows unique property builds, often taking several years and presenting plenty of challenges.

Tonight it returned for its 23^rd season, with the first episode following a groundbreaking project that has never been tackled in the property renovation programme’s 26-year history.

Over the past 30 years, Howard and Sarah have embarked on several ambitious building designs together, but on Grand Designs took on their most radical yet – a sleek, angled, metallic floating home on a tidal estuary near Worthing.

However, it’s fair to say that the finished property was not to every viewer’s taste, with @MillieJonesView making the bold claim on X: ‘Could this be the ugliest home ever on #GrandDesigns? I think so…’

Echoing their sentiment, @stryder444 said: ‘Doesn’t look very homely. All the comfort of a visitor centre. #granddesigns.’

In a savage takedown, @truly_woolie wrote: ‘It looks like a child of Elon’s Cybertruck. Hideous. #GrandDesigns.’

@Jasonharvey70g1 added: It’s a massive cyber truck #GrandDesigns.’

Some Grand Designs viewers, though, were in awe of the scale and the ambition of Howard and Sarah’s project.

@Toady exclaimed: ‘Oh this looks gloriously mad #GrandDesigns.’

@TheMizzCBB said: ‘This one is very bonkers. I like the design but how will the bottom look like in a few years? #granddesigns.’

@arrmstronski commented: ‘Well, this looks ambitious. #granddesigns

Designed to look like a boat, and nestled within a houseboat community, the structure sits on an experimental, prefabricated, polystyrene slab to deal with high tides alternating with hours sitting in the mud.

On top of the floating polystyrene will is steel frame strong enough to resist the stresses of a moving structure, covered in composite, insulated steel cladding.

Upstairs there is a soaring, open-plan living space with an outer deck and views of the estuary, while below deck made accommodation for them and their teenage children, a home office and a cinema room.

The couple set aside £385,000 to spend across an 18-month schedule, also planning to do much of the work themselves and finalising the engineering as they went.

Ahead of the episode, a clip showed the pair in the early stages of the process. In one Howard explained their plan to use ‘surfboard technology’.

Showing a paddleboard, he made 15 years ago, he said the construction is ‘very light and can be lifted really easily’.

‘We can make them in a workshop which means we can control the quality, and it also manages the cost because we aren’t having to rent a huge shipyard to make it in one piece,’ he said.

‘But as far as we are aware, no-one has actually used this technology to make a floating home before. We are in the unfortunate position of being the experimenters’.

In a voice-over, Kevin said the ‘radical ethos of this project is hardcore self-build territory’.

The other clip showed them putting together blocks of polystyrene that are being connected by glue, which is then activated when water is sprayed on.

However, they quickly realised there’s a problem when rushing to connect blocks to find they haven’t been cut correctly and didn’t fit…

Speaking ahead of the season premiere, Kevin also offered an insight into what viewers can expect.

‘It is short, we are making something that is not too lengthy, we are making it snappy. We have two new revisits which are really meaningful.  One of the revisits is with a blended family, a couple who were both bereaved and brought their children together into a house. The house is designed by the husband and honestly, it is sort of one of my favourite projects,’ he said.

Grand Designs airs Wednesdays at 9pm on Channel 4.

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