2021 WAS A YEAR OF BIG DEBUTS FOR HGTV SUPERSTARS ERIN AND BEN NAPIER. Not only did the home-renovating power couple premiere three new shows (season five of Home Town, the brand-new Ben’s Workshop, and the six-part docu-series Home Town Takeover), but they also welcomed a second daughter (baby Mae, sister to 4-year-old Helen). These days, though, action-packed years are nothing new to the Napiers—not since HGTV came calling in the summer of 2014. Back then, Erin owned a stationery company, and Ben had just left his job as a youth minister to embark on a woodworking business. Together, they had renovated a 1925 Craftsman cottage in Erin’s sleepy but charming hometown of Laurel, Mississippi (population 18,338), and when the house was featured in a regional magazine, it caught the eye of an HGTV producer. “We thought that she was going to order stationery,” Erin says of receiving the producer’s initial email. “And then, when it turned out that she was interested in pitching us as a TV show, we just didn’t put any kind of faith in that. We were just like, ‘There’s no way this’ll ever happen, because this doesn’t happen to people who live in Laurel, Mississippi.’ And things just kept happening.”
In January 2016, the pilot aired to 2.2 million viewers, making it the highest-rated pilot in the network’s history. The full first season—following Erin and Ben as they revitalized seen-better-days houses throughout, available on Discovery+ and featuring Ben swapping stories with and teaching carpentry to celebrity guests—HGTV is set to air season six of . And in May, Erin will release her first children’s book. Titled , the illustrated book, unsurprisingly, is a celebration of home.
