Big Brother 2005, also known as Big Brother 6, was the sixth series of the British reality television series Big Brother. The show followed sixteen contestants, known as housemates, who were isolated from the outside world for an extended period in a custom-built House. One or more housemates were evicted by a public vote each week. The last remaining housemate, Anthony Hutton, was declared the winner, winning a cash prize of £50,000. Runner-up Eugene Sully also won the same amount during a task two days before the final.

The series launched on Channel 4 on 27 May 2005 and ended on 12 August 2005, lasting 78 days – the fifth longest British edition of Big Brother. Davina McCall returned as presenter for her sixth consecutive year. Thirteen housemates entered on launch night, with three more being introduced in the fourth week. An average of 4.6 million viewers watched the series, the fourth highest viewed series of the show to date (joint with Big Brother 4).

Big Brother 6 received viewer complaints and press attention for various controversial scenes.

Production

Announcement and promotion

The sixth series of Big Brother was first confirmed in 2002, when Channel 4 made a deal with franchise owner Endemol to keep the show on the air until at least 2005. In early 2005, Channel 4 confirmed that Big Brother would return for its sixth series in the summer. After speculation that the "evil" theme from the previous series would not return, executive producer Sharon Powers told the press that Big Brother would "continue to be evil this year".

For the fifth year in a row, Channel 4 commissioned graphic designer Daniel Eatock to create the "Big Brother eye". The eye was a sliced mirror of alternating black and blue strips, in reality, two eyes on top of each other. It was publicly revealed on 30 April 2005. Promotional material included an art installation of the eye at the Truman Brewery in East London, constructed out of over 1000 cardboard boxes (some of which contained televisions).

On 9 May 2005, Channel 4 began airing countdown bumpers eighteen days before the launch.

Presenters and programming

Davina McCall, who had presented the show since its inception in 2000, was confirmed to return to the sixth series as presenter of the live shows, such as launch night, weekly evictions, the finale and other special live shows. Nightly highlights were broadcast on Channel 4, narrated by Marcus Bentley. Dermot O'Leary returned as presenter of Big Brother's Little Brother weekdays on Channel 4 and Sunday lunchtime. On E4, live coverage once again dominated its daily and nightly schedule, with additional live streaming online. Nominations Uncut and Diary Room Uncut also returned. Big Brother's EFourum – introduced in the previous year – was revamped and its name changed to Big Brother's Big Mouth, with Russell Brand continuing as presenter of that show. It was also announced that E4 would be available on the Freeview platform from May 2005 to coincide with the beginning of the series.

Housemates and prize

For the second year, open auditions were used to select housemates; these took place between 5 February and 6 March 2005. The broadcaster told the press that there would be thirteen housemates with a theme of "unlucky thirteen," inspired by triskaidekaphobia.

The winner stood to earn £100,000; however, two days before the final, housemate Eugene was given a dilemma: to take half of the prize money from the grand prize given by Big Brother. He was unaware that refusing the money would have doubled the prize fund to £200,000. He took the money, which meant that the eventual winner, Anthony, only won £50,000 (the same as Eugene).

The House

The House for Big Brother 2005 was a radical change from the oppressive and angled House from the previous year. House designer Patrick Watson described the design as "aspirational and yet not wildly practical." Although the House was still quite small, light pale colours and high camera angles gave the viewer the impression that the House is larger than it is. Watson also revealed that he accomplished this by extensively utilising mirrors for an airier and cooler atmosphere. Channel 4 described the House as the boldest one at the time, and Watson stated it to be complementary to "iPod neutrality."

Pictures of the House were released on 24 May 2005, revealing the outdoor shower and pool. There was a row of three outdoor showers that replaced the need for a complete bathroom; two other toilets were contained indoors, one in the living room and one in the bedroom. The tiled floor lead onto the wooden deck of the pool, and this year, a circular pool is positioned in a corner of the garden. The other side of the showers lead towards the slightly elevated glass-box lounge that originally had multi-levelled green couches but were eventually replaced with low orange ones.

More pictures were released to the press later in the day. These depicted the exterior of the Diary Room: a chaotic web of sliced and angled mirrors giving housemates a distorted reflection of the rest of the House. These pictures also showed that the House was composed of one central, column-free, airy room with cream-coloured carpeting on which the dining table rested and an elevated kitchen containing a row of yellow cabinets. An American-style refrigerator was utilised for the first time, giving the housemates more space for food. It was located next to the storeroom. However, the glass wall that allowed housemates to view the bedroom from the living area was disguised as a mirror to ensure that viewers would not be able to count how many housemates would be in the House. Finally, only a few days before launch night, pictures of a loft in the garden leaked to the press. On Day 1, it was shown that it was painted green rather than the pink shown in the pictures. It was also revealed that the bedroom would contain a "heat-seeking" thermal camera.

The Secret Garden

On the opposite side of the main Diary Room entrance was another door leading to the "Secret Garden". The Secret Garden was an indoor room decorated like a jungle. It contained a fridge, basic cooking utensils and crockery, a hatch, three beds, a decorative stag head (revealed to be able to speak), a television screen and an adjoining toilet. The Garden also contained a telephone that Big Brother used to communicate quietly with the secret housemates and a "Quiet" sign that illuminated whenever one of the main housemates occupied the Diary Room.

It was first used on Day 29, when housemates Kinga Karolczak, Orlaith McAllister and Eugene Sully secretly entered the House minutes after Roberto Conte was evicted. The three housemates had to live in the Secret Garden for several days, with only Makosi knowing their existence. The only clothing initially supplied to the three secret housemates was fig-leaf underwear. With Makosi's help, they had to steal clothes and food from the main Big Brother House when the other housemates were asleep and to make sure that the other housemates did not find out about them. The secret housemates stayed in the Secret Garden until Day 32 when Makosi selected Orlaith and Eugene to enter the main House and become actual housemates.

Housemates

Thirteen housemates entered the House on Day 1. In week 5, three other housemates entered the Secret Garden. Makosi then chose two of them to join the main House: Orlaith and Eugene. When Orlaith voluntarily left weeks later, Kinga, the third housemate from the Secret Garden, re-entered the House.

Name	Age	Hometown	Occupation	Day entered	Day exited	Status
Anthony Hutton	23	Newcastle	70s dancer	1	78	Winner
Eugene Sully	27	Crawley	Student	29	78	Runner-up
Makosi Musambasi	24	Buckinghamshire (originally from Zimbabwe)	Cardiac nurse	1	78	3rd Place
Kinga Karolczak	20	London	Market researcher	29	32	4th place
				66	78
Craig Coates	20	Norfolk	Hairstylist	1	76	Evicted
Derek Laud	40	London	Speechwriter	1	71	Evicted
Orlaith McAllister	26	Belfast	Student/model	29	65	Walked
Kemal Shahin	19	London	Student/male belly dancer	1	64	Evicted
Kieron "Science" Harvey	22	Leeds	Entertainment entrepreneur	1	57	Evicted
Vanessa Layton-McIntosh	19	London	Student	1	50	Evicted
Maxwell Ward	24	London	Maintenance engineer	1	43	Evicted
Saskia Howard-Clarke	23	London	Promotions girl	1	36	Evicted
Roberto Conte	32	Liverpool (originally from Italy)	Teacher	1	29	Evicted
Sam Heuston	23	London	Student	1	22	Evicted
Lesley Sanderson	19	Huddersfield	Sales assistant	1	15	Evicted
Mary O'Leary	30	Dublin	Psychic advisor/writer/white witch	1	8	Evicted

Walks

Housemate	Day	Reason	Method
Orlaith McAllister	65	She wanted to keep her life outside the house private.	Diary Room