The new season of Bargain Block is in full swing on HGTV and GLAAD Media Award nominees Keith Bynum and Evan Thomas are back and are on a journey to restore Detroit’s iconic American neighborhood.
The real-life couple took time out of their busy schedule of buying rundown houses on a single block and transforming them into starter homes to chat with GLAAD’s Anthony Allen Ramos about the new season and celebrating their 10th anniversary together as a couple.
“Detroit is amazing,” Thomas told Ramos in a recent interview. “The whole culture there, it’s like nowhere else that where I’ve ever lived where people just allow you to be yourself. And there’s this energy of getting into your business and trying to make you a certain way, or making sure that you live your life in a particular kind of way. Everyone’s like ‘you do you and I will do me and we’re all good’ and that’s kind of the whole experience that we’ve had since moving there.”
Bynum adds that they are welcoming and supportive of LGBTQ people. “It doesn’t matter who you are, what walk of life [you’re from],” he said. “There’s this community feel and it’s not just a feeling, it’s real. When you need something, there’s a bunch of people there who are willing and ready to help. It’s remarkable.”
Having grown up in Texas, Bynum has encountered homophobia while working in construction. Bargain Block has changed that and has bolstered more opportunities in the construction industry for the LGBTQ+ community.
“The amount of very hateful things that I heard was very shocking and it kind of was an eye opener,” Bynum said of his time working in construction. “It’s really odd, you can go your whole life and not experience any of it. [When I came out] my family disowned me, I wound up moving to Colorado. And so, you know, it just made me really aware of the struggles that people go through when you’re different, when you don’t fit into the norm.”
In addition, the couple — who met on Match.com — participated in a rapid fire couple quiz and they talked about his “dream” wedding (it was literally a dream he had about them getting married) that had him in tears while both of them gave advice on succeeding in business as a couple.
“If you’re working with your partner, I would say you just have to learn how to compromise and let go of things,” said Thomas. “You just have to continue.”
“I think that’s a really good way of putting it,” Bynum agreed. “I’ve grown so much because I’ve been able to let go… I used to love rhinestone and turquoise so much, but Evan has helped me let go of some of those things..he’s taught me a lot on restraint, that’s helped a lot…but yeah, I’ve had to let go of a lot of things.”
Bargain Block airs Wednesdays at 9pm on HGTV.