Big Brother 17 House Gets Bigger And Beachier

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Temperatures heat up this week, kicking off summer and the start of Big Brother.

"When its summer, you think of Big Brother, and when you think of Big Brother, you think of people in bikinis and suntan oil…hot bodies…the beach," host Julie Chen said.

The Big Brother 17 house features a distinct beach theme, with plenty of sky, nature and ocean waves, plus a 22-foot giant steel wave cresting over the living room.

"I like it because in order to survive in the Big Brother house, you have to be as strong as steel. You have to be able to bend and flex and go with the flow like a wave," she said.

This season promises to be the biggest to date, and the house has already fulfilled that promise, gaining 155 square feet of living space and 100 microphones to capture every sound, word and game play.

A new addition to the Big Brother house is the transparent sky bridge, where houseguests inside will have nowhere to hide.

"I was walking up there before -- it feels a little bit dangerous. I mean, its secure – but isn't that what playing Big Brother is all about?" Chen said. "You think that you're secure, but you never know when the floor is going to drop out from under you, and someone is going to stab you in the back and evict you. And you thought you were in an alliance."

Big Brother 17 premieres next week on CBS 2.