The Block 2025 Back Of House Reveal: A Half-Point Photo Finish (And A Dobber)

Right, let’s set the scene. It’s back of house week in Daylesford, the glamorous stretch of the build where five teams pour their hearts, their marriages and roughly the GDP of a small country into laundries, mudrooms, powder rooms, pantries and garages. Twenty-five rooms, one weekend, and apparently every single Blockhead decided the secret to winning was parking a vintage MG in the garage. Great minds. Or, more accurately, minds that watch the same Pinterest boards.

Throw in a wedding-anniversary-slash-near-divorce, a neighbourly dob-in over a deck, a paint scraper meltdown and a Move with McCafe boxing class that nobody asked for, and you’ve got a classic Block Sunday. Only half a point separated first from second by the end of it. Let’s get into it.

Final Score Card

Half. A. Point. That’s the gap between first and second place this week, which is the kind of margin that makes you want to go back and re-count every splashback tile yourself. Britt and Taz snuck home with 28 points (including a rare perfect 10 from Shaynna, who apparently left her heart in their powder room), while Han and Can’s “not so country” black-and-white fantasy garage came agonisingly close on 27.5.

At the other end, Emma and Ben’s floor plan copped a proper spray from all three judges and they finished rock bottom on 22 points, a full six points adrift of the winners. Nobody won the $10,000 Commonwealth Bank budget reward either, because at least one team blew their budget by a genuinely alarming $20,000. That prize now jackpots to $20,000 next week, which feels like handing someone who’s already overspending an even bigger stick to overspend with. On the bright side, Britt and Taz also pocketed $10,000 in Arnott’s Big Bickies money, “just when you needed it most,” as Scott Cam put it.

Rank	Team	Score	Judges’ Verdict
🥇 1st	Britt & Taz	28 points (+ a 10 from Shaynna)	“This house just delivers in spades… this is unfault-able.”
🥈 2nd	Han & Can	27.5 points	“They’ve bitten off a lot and they’ve chewed like hell… very, very impressive.”
🥉 3rd	Sonny & Alicia (Leish)	26.5 points	“They’ve delivered far more than I would expect is appropriate.”
4th	Robby & Mat	25.5 points	“This is just a blank space with a clever ceiling.”
5th	Emma & Ben	22 points	“I’m sorry, Ben and Emma, but you’ve got this floor plan wrong.”

Emma and Ben: The Floor Plan That Broke Three Judges At Once

Emma and Ben went bold this week, smashing their laundry and butler’s pantry into one combined zone with a genuinely clever secret weapon: a washer and dryer elevated to waist height so nobody has to bend over like a peasant. The judges loved it, Darren said he’s stealing the idea for his own place, and the e&s appliances and warm chestnut cabinetry got genuine praise. Their powder room, all black tiles, moody floral wallpaper and a striking Grafico print, was called “Instagram worthy” and “a jewellery box.” So far, so good.

Then the judges actually tried to use the room, and it fell apart. Two sinks, a fridge stranded near the master bedroom, and a coffee station competing for bench space with absolutely everything else. Marty called it “a waste of square meterage.” Shaynna went further, declaring the whole thing “almost unworkable” as a laundry, and “it does not feel a butler’s pantry to me.” Their mudroom copped it too, criticised for having nowhere to actually hang a coat, which is, arguably, the entire point of a mudroom. Even their vintage MG in the garage, meant to be their point of difference, got upstaged when two other teams had exactly the same idea. They finished the week dead last on 22 points, a full six points behind the leaders.

“I’m sorry, Ben and Emma, but you’ve got this floor plan wrong.”

Marty Fox

“The natural light is beautiful. The materials are stunning, but it seems to be no strategy to the way that they’ve actually planned the room.”

Marty Fox

Han and Can: The Garage Gallery, The MG Motorbike, And A Paint Scraper Standoff

“We’re broke. Help me, I’m poor,” Han announced early in the episode, which is possibly the most relatable sentence anyone has said on this show all season. Han and Can, self-described “dykes on bikes” who are “retro, urban, eccentric, fun, lux, expensive, rich girls”, went hard on a black-and-white garage-as-workshop concept, complete with Hexa lighting, an epoxy checkerboard floor, and a genuine Harley motorbike parked next to their laundry appliances. The judges were obsessed. Marty called it “showroom quality in a residential setting” and reckoned it could make them “the dark horse” of the whole season.

It wasn’t all smooth sailing indoors. A missing high-nap roller and a hunt through the bins for a paint scraper tipped into a proper blow-up, complete with the sort of icy “I’m not your mate” energy usually reserved for actual enemies rather than the person you share a mortgage with. Their Cosentino stone and Dekton benchtops in the butler’s pantry were singled out for their “80s kind of glamour,” and Darren couldn’t get past how “very expensive” the whole thing felt. It paid off, 27.5 points, second place, and just half a point off the win.

“They’ve bitten off a lot and they’ve chewed like hell… and this is a really beautiful result. And it’s very, very impressive.”

Darren Palmer

“I’m about to go home if you don’t find me a paint scraper.” / “Mate, I don’t know where the paint scrape, ” / “I’m not your mate.”

Han and Can, mid-meltdown

Britt and Taz: The Country Estate That Captured Shaynna’s Heart (And A 10)

Britt and Taz won the week outright, 28 points and a full 10 from Shaynna for their powder room, which is the kind of score you don’t get by accident. Every surface in their five spaces carried “some putty colour or texture,” according to the judges, and their laundry-slash-butler’s-pantry combo with the Speed Queen commercial-grade washer had Darren declaring it “the best way to handle this space, bar none.” Their garage went full “bougie,” with gold wallpaper, Bromley art and a genuine Freedom cabinetry fit-out that had Marty calling it “understated luxury” and “sexy.”

They weren’t spared drama, though. Earlier in the week, they copped a full-day trade shutdown after being dobbed in for allegedly working ahead on their deck subframe, reported, awkwardly, by their own neighbours Sonny and Leish. Taz wasn’t thrilled about losing a day right when he needed it most, and there was more than a little side-eye flying between the two houses for the rest of the episode. Didn’t seem to slow them down where it counted, though, this was, by the judges’ own admission, “the first house today, like, you know, it’s house number three where we all go, ‘I’d live here. I’d buy it.’”

“I have to say, the quality of finishing is incredible. This is something that I’m definitely going to be replicating in my place… because this is unfault-able.”

Darren Palmer

“It’s so high end, it’s kind of ridiculous… by far the best of the day. Who would have thought a toilet could do it?”

Shaynna Blaze, on the powder room

Sonny and Leish: Waterproof Monday, A $10K Slab, And The Dob-In Heard Round Daylesford

Sonny and Alicia, universally “Leish”, spent this episode celebrating their 10th wedding anniversary while simultaneously informing production they’d “nearly been divorced Friday night,” which tracks for a couple who apparently run their marriage the same way they run their build. They were also the team who flagged Britt and Taz’s deck subframe to production as working ahead, earning Sonny the nickname “the big bad wolf” from his own neighbours and a chorus of “don’t mess with Sonny” ringing out across the site.

Inside, they leaned hard into texture and finish: a drying cabinet the judges called “a luxury inclusion,” a full suite of Asko appliances, the first fridge spotted in any butler’s pantry all day, and Reece‘s Milli Etch tapware, which Darren reckoned “just says quality” every time you touch it. Their powder room stone, a Viola slab reportedly worth around $10,000, was singled out as “the best water closet I’ve seen today,” with Marty going full sensory-overload silence: “Sorry, I just said so many things and didn’t utter a word.” Even Leish’s Myer cashback hunting for laundry towels via the Commbank Yello app got a mention, because no expense, or minor discount, goes undocumented on this show. Third place on 26.5 points, though the judges pointedly noted they’re still yet to win an actual room.

“That basin, that plinth. It’s so handmade and earthy… that is just something you’d see in a high end boutique hotel.”

Darren Palmer

“If I’m the big bad wolf, so be it.”

Sonny

Robby and Mat: A Screed Ten Mil Out, Two Red MGs, And A Garage That Just Didn’t Sell The Dream

Robby and Mat, “not a bad effort for a couple of hairdressers,” according to Scott Cam, hit a genuine construction scare this week when their waterproofing turned out to be roughly ten millimetres lower than the screed, prompting a very confused “we have no idea” from the pair. Their NEFF appliance-fitted butler’s pantry and French-pattern tiled mudroom scored genuine love from the judges, “these are, like, my favourite tiles ever,” gushed Shaynna, but their Euro laundry copped a hiding for being all style, no storage. Marty called it “form before function,” warning the family-sized house needed somewhere better than the dining table to fold washing.

Their garage was the third to roll out a vintage MG, two red ones this time, plus the season’s first dedicated car-cleaning kit, but where Britt and Taz’s and Han and Can’s garages felt like an extension of the house, Robby and Mat’s read as, in Marty’s words, “just a blank space with a clever ceiling.” Fourth place on 25.5 points, agonisingly close but not quite selling the Daylesford dream the judges were after.

“We’ve seen three houses that have sold us the dream, and this just feels very functional.”

Darren Palmer

“How fun is it putting together the hexagon light?” “Let me tell you this, I nearly had five nervous breakdowns.”

Robby and Mat

How It All Wrapped Up

By the time Scott Cam finished reading out scores, the internal build was officially done for every team, but the drama was just getting started: Britt and Taz took the win by the narrowest of margins with 28 points and a perfect 10 from Shaynna, edging out Han and Can’s dark-horse garage gallery by half a point; Sonny and Leish’s texture-heavy country charm landed them third despite the neighbourly dob-in scandal and their ongoing room-win drought; Robby and Mat’s waterproofing scare and “blank space” garage kept them at fourth; and Emma and Ben’s beautifully finished but badly planned back-of-house zone left them rock bottom, six points off the pace. Nobody took home the Commbank budget prize either, which now jackpots to $20,000, and with the whole Block moving outdoors into alfresco, backyard and front facade territory over the next three weeks, someone is about to need that money very badly. Grab a coffee, get comfortable, and we’ll see you back here for the next disaster.