Craig Conover and Kyle Cooke suffered a falling out earlier this year after Kyle called out his longtime friend for partnering up with Spritz Society, a rival of his Loverboy brand. But where do they stand today?
During a couple of new interviews, the 36-year-old Southern Charm cast member offered an update on his friendship with Kyle, teased the upcoming ninth season of Summer House, and explained how he’s preparing for a future family with Paige DeSorbo, 31, while also dishing on his new restaurant with Austen Kroll, 37.
“You’ll have to watch Summer House coming up because I do go up there, so we flush it out, which is good,” Craig confirmed to E! News on September 23. “Everyone in life just has different perspectives.”
According to Craig, he was caught off-guard when Kyle dissed him publicly because he felt like their relationship was stronger than that.
“Kyle is actually one of my closest friends in the Bravo world,” he shared. “I really enjoy going to film with him, I like hanging with him, we used to do double dates, so I was surprised because I think our friendship goes outside of filming. I was just bummed.”
The interior decorator also didn’t anticipate the partnership causing such strife.
“If any of my friends ever got an offer to do something with a home decor company, I would want them to do it,” he noted. “I think the spaces are really big and I think a rising tide lifts all ships. I think we just look at things differently, and that’s okay.”
“I do like Kyle a lot and we’ve had a lot of good memories throughout the [years]. So I think it was more I didn’t understand it. I also was just shocked,” he continued. “You’ll get to see how that plays out when Summer House comes out.”
Although Craig didn’t share their exact status, he said he’s excited for everyone to see how their feud plays out on Summer House season nine.
“I think there’s a lot of good messages that come from it,” he teased.
As for his future with Paige, Craig confirmed he’s getting ready now.
“I’m really business-focused right now, but that just comes from wanting to build stuff for our future family,” Craig said in another interview with E! News on September 24. “I think I’m very family oriented as in I wanna have a good foundation so that, when the kids come, I can be with them as much as possible. Your priorities shift a little bit.”
According to Craig, he’s grown up a lot since fans first met him on the debut season of Southern Charm in March 2014.
“I’ve made a lot of changes in my life over the last two years,” he shared. “As you try to start to grow up and be better, it pulls you out of different activities that you used to do.”
As he looks ahead, Craig hopes to create a successful empire for himself that will allow him to support Paige and their future children.
“You gotta wake up and put one foot in front of the other,” he stated. “You never have it all figured out. We’re all just doing this for the first time, no one actually knows what they’re doing completely. We’re just trying our best. I’m still trying to figure out life, but I will say that it’s fun to have my hand in a lot of different arenas.”
As for his new Charleston restaurant with Austen, called By the Way, Craig confirmed their business venture would be featured on season 10 of Southern Charm.
“It’s really fun to work with your friends if it works, but there’s a reason people say that it’s risky,” he admitted. “So you’ll see us try to survive that and balance that line, because there is a lot of money involved and everyone has different ways of doing things.”
