No.1 for Interviews - John Amabile
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A skilled interior designer, John Amabile is just as well-known for his witty banter and trademark kilt as his 60 Minute Makeovers and now for losing an amazing four stone!
He is known for making-over other people’s houses on hit shows such as Change That and Better Homes but now the Scottish interior designer has given himself a
make-over, losing an amazing four stone.
His career has taken him from being behind the scenes as a set designer on Taggart and Wheel of Fortune to his first presenting gig on fashion show Get It On. Today he is part of the ever-popular daytime show 60 Minute Makeover.
Having done some modelling in the 80s, he is no stranger to battling with his weight and, using a strict calorie controlled diet, he has won at last.
Here he shares two very exciting secrets: how he lost the weight and if they really do make-over almost an entire house in just one hour…
You are currently doing 60 Minute Makeover. Is it really done in only an hour?
Yes and it is a completely well-choreographed hour. It’s basically a game of two halves. The whistle is blown and we try to get all the wet jobs done first: the painting and then the wallpapering. When it’s the commercial break after half an hour, you have your cup of tea and we have an hour break to let the paint dry – a wee sneaky bit there. After that it’s mostly the furniture coming into place – it’s like a big jigsaw putting it all together.
The show’s new format means that the designer is also the presenter. How’s that been going?
I’m a control freak anyway so the new series is great for me. I absolutely love it and it’s not to take anything away from [former presenters] Claire Sweeney or Terri Dwyer, because I love them, but it gives me a chance to communicate with the family and I can explain at the end why I did something.
I have been very lucky: I’ve not done anything in a show that people didn’t like. As a designer, I interview someone to get the brief and find out what they like. If I then do something that they didn’t like, to me it just means that I didn’t listen properly.
You’ve lost weight recently and are looking great. What’s your secret?
There are many ways to lose weight and I have been on a diet since I was 15. I have been fat and thin and the years I was modelling I was ridiculous about eating – we didn’t have the information to healthily lose weight then. This time I wanted something to quickly and efficiently help me lose weight. To do that, I used a company called All About W8.
What did the diet involve?
I had a meal a day, which was 4oz of fish or chicken and unlimited vegetables. Throughout the rest of the day I had All About W8’s Mealpaks. For me it was fantastic as one day I am in Glasgow, the next in Manchester or Liverpool and I no longer had to go into a shop to buy lunch and think, ‘There’s nothing healthy in here, I’ll just have a pie and a sausage roll,’ which I usually did.
How much did you lose?
I started it last June and by September I had lost 60 pounds. I gave myself a ‘60 Pound Makeover’!
Was it quite easy to stick to?
If you’re honest, I don’t think any diet is what you want to do. Everyone just wants to eat what they want so from that point of view it wasn’t easy. It was easy in that it was very quick and very safe. Week on week I was losing pounds and I didn’t feel empty or hungry but I did miss my old bad habits sometimes. But to be honest, nothing tasted as good as that slimness felt. As the pounds melted away and people were commenting on me all the time it felt better than the food.
There has been quite a lot of controversy around regarding the Light Life diet recently…
Dieting is a choice. I would never say, ‘You should do this.’ I had over four stones to lose and I wanted something that would work – bear in mind I did check with my doctor. Yes it is a very low calorie diet but I found for me, that it worked. I ran the 10k last year as well – before that my only motivation to run was if the ice cream van was pulling away! I’ve got so much more get up and go now.
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