When Jamie Lentzner first laid eyes on the five-bedroom, two bath house in Foster City, it was the ugliest house on the street.  The 1966 tract home had been a rental for 20 years and vacant for the last 12 months.  It was a wreck of a place when they saw it in 2001 and it didn't look much different than a foreclosure of 2009 does now.

Weeds grew waist-high in the front yard and shingles were curling off the roof.  Inside was worse: ceilings were painted black to match the awful driftwood mantle, dead rodents were in the attic, and who would even want to imagine what that brown shag rug had seen?

"It was the house people didn't let their kids walk by," Jamie said.  "But I knew there was more to this place than the bad shag rug."

And just like struggling homeowners are doing in these tough times, Jamie began a remodel on a budget.

With her husband, Darin, giving a reluctant okay, Jamie started to transform the bedraggled house into a warm and welcoming family home.  Along the way, she found her true calling as an artist and businesswoman.

It was that extra special, homemade touch she added to her children's rooms – hand-painted decorative tiles – that launched her career.  What started with oohs and ahhs from her friends in 2002, turned into a business that now sells painted tiles to some of the fanciest children's shops in the country and hang in the homes of such celebrities as Oprah and Nicole Kidman.  She has been featured on the pages of Better Homes and Gardens and Celebrity Living, and her tiles have been seen on "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" and "CBS Saturday Morning Early Show."

After a career as an animator, she traded it all to become a stay at home mom in 1999& and took on the task of remodeling their home with a little bit of money and a lot of elbow grease.  Immediately, she and her husband replaced the roof, painted the black ceilings white and removed the brown shag revealing oak floors.  DIY project, anyone?  In the bathroom, they ripped out flooring, added a new granite sink and painted.  Crown molding was added throughout the house.

In the kitchen/family room, she replaced the counter tops and four layers of linoleum flooring.  They kept the maple cabinets, but updated them with a coat of paint and hardware.  But it was the kids' rooms Jamie looked forward to redoing the most.

Jamie was drawn to green and pink for her daughters' room and found many affordable treasures at Target and Pottery Barn bedding.  "I wanted everything to look simple and fun, not old or too sophisticated," said Jamie.  One of her favorite pieces is the antique vanity her mother had found when her daughter was just born.

But still, something was missing, something that said – quite literally – that this was "Abigail's room."  After searching without luck in catalogs and stores, Jamie decided to make Name Tiles for her daughter on individual tiles.  With brush in hand, she painted each letter of her daughter's name intertwined with flowers and polka dots.

She did the same thing for the room of her 6-year-old son, Grant, who loved airplanes.  After painting clouds and planes on his walls and ceiling, she made name tiles for him as well using whimsical airplane details.

"My friends all loved them and wanted them for themselves," Jamie said.  Pretty soon, she was taking orders and a new venture was launched.  "My husband and I used to work at night when the children went to bed, and I would work when they slept during the day.  I would send out emails at night to prospective stores and I would paint in between feedings and baths.  Sometimes they would sit on my lap as I tried to ship out products.  We would make constant trips to deliver my products to local stores," she said.

Within months, she hired staff and temporarily moved the team of eight into the garage.  Jamie's Painting & Design became so successful, however, that she moved the operation into a warehouse five minutes from her home in 2006.  The garage has been transformed into the kids playroom complete with foosball, the ever-popular Lego table and art supplies.

"I don't think you need to have expensive furniture and artwork to have a beautiful home," she said. "I love that people enjoy my home and that they feel welcome in my home."  It is hard to imagine that seven years ago this house was the worst on the block, or that this stay-at-home mom would turn her talent into her livelihood.

Related Posts:

Hand-painted Tiles for a Special Pirate or Princess
Kitchen Gets An Entertaining Makeover
From Ranch to Craftsman in Saratoga
Updating Kid's Playhouse to Tween's Club House
Los Gatos: Modern Nursery with Vintage Flair

Here's the complete slideshow:

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 14th, 2009 at 8:05 am and is filed under Bungalow, Decorating, Home Decor, Inside Stories, Inside Story, Sheila. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.