When Gretchen and Dominic Kotab first saw this 1930 Spanish-style home in San Jose, they thought it would be perfect for their growing family. The living room with its 15-foot ceilings and exposed rustic wood beams was ideal for their piano — along with all the lessons for their children to come.

“It just had a lot of charm,” Gretchen said, including original hardwood floors throughout.

 The kitchen faced the back of the house, so Gretchen could keep an eye on the kids in the backyard. The house was already graciously proportioned, with four bedrooms and three baths. But the kitchen and bathrooms hadn’t been touched in decades. The family lived in the house for five years before moving out for a substantial remodel when their oldest entered kindergarten at St. Martin’s.

“It was chaos,” Gretchen said.

Her favorite part of the project was a trip to Los Angeles to Mission Tile West, where she chose gorgeous, vintage-inspired tile for the kitchen and baths. The kitchen backsplash is especially fabulous, with a cream and green interlocking pattern. Their master bath is small, but Gretchen wanted to make it elegant, choosing Carrera marble. They expanded the front and back patios, covering the front with Spanish tile and the back with slate. With the children ages 3, 5 and 7 now, the house is just right.

They opened their doors this fall for the Rose Garden Homes Tour. Floral Designer Jose Ibarra worked his magic in nearly every room, from the dining room table and sideboard, to the branches on the living room mantle, to the front courtyard. A master at work!

Here’s the complete slideshow:

With help from Steve Gilbert of Willow Glen Home and Garden, the homeowners, Virginia and Brett Nicoletti, have created the kind of rooms you want to live in. They graciously opened their home to the 2011 Willow Glen Lifestyles home tour.

The front bedroom with the orange palette was one of my favorites. Don’t you just love the bedding?

And the youngest daughter also has a haven all in pink. I also love the vintage-style bedspread in this room.

The 1992 home began an update when the Nicolettis bought it in 2000. They extended hardwoods throughout the house and antiqued the kitchen cabinets.   The result is an elegant space, upstairs and down.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Thierry Buisson’s parents met in a French military hospital in Marrakech, Morocco. She was a local nurse born and raised there. He was a doctor from a farming village in the south of France.Growing up in Paris, Buisson spent time in both places, from his grandparents’ rustic farmhouse to the colorful marketplaces of Marrakech.Buisson, who came to the United States two decades ago, is a personal shopper at Neiman Marcus in San Francisco and does interior design work on the side. A dining room he decorated with zebra skin and a custom-made topiary of his dog Winston, of all things, was featured in the Summit League’s “Homes for the Holidays” tour last Christmas.

His love of collecting started with his father.

When Buisson was a boy, he and his father would spend weekends at Paris flea markets and antique shops, searching for

“just that magical piece that turns you on.”

It was there he learned “the patience of finding something that makes your heart beat.”

His father would often collect small things, silver and china.

“The biggest piece he ever bought was an 18th-century Aubusson tapestry. My mom just freaked out,” Buisson said. “My dad had to justify every purchase, either hide it or bring it out for a birthday.”

In summers, they would often visit his grandparents in the village of Le Breuil. He remembers two things about the farmhouse in particular:a huge fireplace in the kitchen along with a “gigantic dining room table,” as well as the handmade, white linen sheets in the bedroom that were so cold “it would take us hours to get in bed.”

And every Christmas, the family would travel to his mother’s homeland of Marrakech, where he absorbed the spicy aromas and the colorful textiles. “It’s the most phenomenal, magical place I’ve ever been to,” he said.

And now the home he shares with his partner is filled with the influences of his youth, inside and out.

The front walkway is lined with potted citrus trees, giving you the feeling of approaching a French “orangerie.” Inside, a 19th-century, hand-painted French vaisselier for storing and displaying china sits in the living room — a find from friend Darin Geise who owns the Coup d’Etat showroom across from the Design Center in San Francisco. Atop a leather ottoman is a bright green tray and a Moroccan lantern. Louis XVI chairs are covered in charcoal grey Pierre Frey toile. French doors lead you to a deck that looks like the courtyard of a boutique hotel, with topiaries and Moroccan-tiled wrought-iron tables. On an end table in a guest room is a collection of miniature porcelain busts he collected from the Alameda Point Antiques Faire. In his room, he keeps a collection of antique boxes. His sister, who owns an antique shop in the seventh arrondissement of Paris called “Fauve,” sends him a tiny box for every birthday.

And in an ode to his grandparents, on his bed he keeps French linen sheets. But unlike the farmhouse in France, in his masterbedroom, he has a fireplace to keep them warm.

(Thierry Buisson can be reached at thierryinteriors@gmail.com or 408-828-1685.)

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Rustic Boys Bedroom

My decorating has always been relegated to the main living areas of my home.  I loved seeing the Holiday Home Tour showing me, how I might transform my kid’s bedrooms into a winter wonderland.  Chris Gomo  worked some holiday magic on two of the bedrooms at the Joye home.

Snowman with Twig Trees

First up is a rustic bedroom for a boy.  I love the  fun Chris used  with plaids, pine cones and twig Christmas Trees.   The overall feeling is warm and cozy—perfect for reading in bed with the covers up to your chin.

Holiday Glam for a Tween

Chris went to town on this girlie tween room.  I simply adored all the pink and silver. This room was over the top with glamor.  I’m feeling I’d like something like this in my own room—but don’t think my husband would go for all the glitz.

Decked Out Headboard

So—do you decorate your kids bedrooms for the holidays? Do you go the whole nine yards or little touches? I’d love to know!

I’m also including the Jack and Jill bath between the rooms in the slideshow.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

What started as a simple ranch house built in 1954 has been transformed over the past 20 years by the Kenny family into a French Chateuu in the country manor style. And Linda Floyd of Linda L. Floyd Interior Design has been with the  homeowners every step of the way.  The home decor is French inspired with trims and tassels and elegance.  Linda also decorated the living room for the holidays and the Summit League Homes for the Holidays tour.

The dining room was spectacular for the tour, as Sharon Watts of Peony created an astonishing table display.

David Stonesifer of David Stonesifer Interior Design and Decoration appointed the family room, including a couple of oil paintings he created himself.

Debi Campbell of Cover Story on Main Street in Los Altos added sparked to the kitchen and bath.

Upstairs, the daughter’s bedroom was decorated by Wahlberg Designs, The Duke & The Duchess of Morgan Hill. Saffron and Genevieve in Santa Cruz created the boy’s room with wonderful linen bed spreads and the master bedroom and bath received the special touch of Warmth Company from Aptos. Tiffany and Co. created a special display in the upper hallway.

Lulu Pom of Los Gatos appointed the study; La Jardiniere brought whiteness and light to the backyard and Color in the Garden from San Jose created an inviting front entrance.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Walk in the front door of this charming 1940 brick cottage and the front rooms are as traditional as you’d imagine: graceful dining room on the left, formal living on the right. But step through the front hallway and the back of the house opens to a modern, light-filled space.

Phil Health, who works at Nasa Ames Research Center, and Sam Miller, who owns a Mountain View laundromat, bought the house in June 2009, deciding they wanted to downsize after remodeling their big house on a big lot on the Peninsula.

They turned to San Jose architect Steve Hinderberger to update the dated and chopped up space and add a second story with a master suite. The couple wanted sleek, modern lines, but also were adamant about connecting with the rest of the traditional house. Hinderberger used wood detailing in rich stains, but gave modern details, including aluminum accents, on the stair railings and support columns.

The kitchen features green, orange and yellow tiles from San Jose’s Fireclay Tile. While the windows in the front of the house are divided light, the couple used no panes in the French doors overlooking the backyard.

Slate tile floors run from the kitchen through to the outdoor patio, connecting indoors and out. Upstairs, frosted sliding glass doors give privacy to the master suite, but let in light. The master bath was tiled in “boneyard” pieces of tile in different shapes and sheens to give added interest. A neighbor once likened the shower tile to a “bamboo forest.”

They have decorated the house with artwork collected along their travels as well as local “open studio” events. A prized pair of art deco console tables purchased at a San Francisco auction adorn the living room. The couple opened their home to the Rose Garden Homes Tour, benefitting St. Martin of Tours schools.

GreenDesign provided the floral pieces. The landscaping and hardscaping was done by Rodriquez Landscape.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

When Nora Sandoval first stepped into this house in 1997, lockers lined the entry way, desks were scattered through the living room and baby cribs lined the library. Surely this wasn’t a house for sale, she thought. In fact, though, it was a home for some 16 teenaged unwed mothers run by the Volunteers of America.

It was time for this 1912 home originally owned by a dentist and his wife and their six children to revert to a single family. But with stenciled rattles painted up the stairway and each bedroom painted in a flower theme (daisy, rose and violet) it needed a lot of work.

Still, said Nora, a Realtor with the Sereno Group, “when I came in here, I felt good karma. There was a lot of love in this house.”

Over the past 13 years, Sandoval and her husband, Adobe executive Digby Horner, and their now-grown son, Matthew, made it their own. Digby did most of the detail work himself, including stripping hinges, and adorned the ceilings throughout the home with his collections of antique light fixtures and shades. They splurged on Bradbury and Bradbury wallpaper for the living room, which hadn’t been produced by the Benicia manufacturer since it ran the 17-color paper for singer Linda Ronstadt 11 years earlier.

A century-old pool table from Pennsylvania adds gravitas to the room. The couple recently finished a major kitchen remodel, adding a sunny breakfast room with a beadboard ceiling they had milled to match the original laundry room walls.

Upstairs, the house has what appears to be twin master bedrooms connected by a walk-through closet. The couple is waiting to finish the front landscaping until they determine whether their efforts to save the oak tree out front are successful.
For years after they moved in, people would leave bags of baby clothes and diapers on their front porch. When the mailman left soap samples, he would stuff 20 through the mail slot.
“This house has wrapped its arms around a lot of people,” Nora said, “and now we’re wrapping our arms around this house.”

The couple readied the house for the Rose Garden Homes Tour, benefitting St. Martin of Tours school. Hill’s Flowers providing the floral arrangements.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Liz Page was pregnant with their first child in 2002 when she and her husband Mark first laid eyes on this charming New England-style home. Liz grew up in Massachusetts and the traditional home with the formal entry hall and central staircase just felt right.

She wrote a “tear-stained letter” to the owner saying “this is where we want to raise our family.”

The house became their home on Halloween, the night the neighborhood comes to life with hundreds of children trick or treating. While the house had great bones, it was in its original 1940 condition and needed updating. Construction began two days after her son, Douglas, was born.

They ripped up wall-to-wall carpeting to reveal mint-condition hardwood floors, and redid electrical and plumbing. To add a master suite, they built over the existing living room. The kitchen was remodeled and a mudroom added.

And just recently, they pushed out the back, adding a family room behind the living room, and an office on top, an extension of the master suite, for Mark, a marketing executive. In the end, they got exactly what they wanted: a charming family home that maintained the look and feel of the original.

Both their children, Douglas and Anna, attend St. Martin of Tours elementary school. Liz sought out Willow Glen Home and Garden to help choose comfortable family furniture paired with fun accessories as well as designing the back garden area with patios, trellises, stone walls, a fountain, umbrellas and patio furniture. The home was featured on the Rose Garden Homes Tour, benefitting St. Martin of Tours. It wouldn’t be complete without Jose Ibarra, who came in and worked magic with his floral designs throughout the house.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

When you’re getting your house ready for a home tour, it’s great to have a loyal crew. Into the night, homeowner Anna Pizzo, her designer Kathleen Monarch and stager Margo Leal pulled out their favorite things to create sumptuous tablescapes, indoors and out, to complement Pizzo’s updated storybook Tudor. And a home tour just isn’t complete without floral designer Jose Ibarra coming in with his finishing touches, including a dramatic spray of dogwood in the front window.

 (Don’t you just love it when homeowners make the front window look great from inside and out, instead of just leaving the back of a couch for all eyes to see? A big thank-you from Lookiloos everywhere!) Take a look at the ceiling beams. Those were added as part of an extensive remodel, but they look like they’ve been there forever. “We made the house authentic to the time period and added special architectural details that weren’t there to begin with,” Monarch said. “We plastered, stuccoed, glazed. You name it, we did it.”  Pizzo’s husband, Chris, of C. Pizzo Construction, made the vision a reality.

Pizzo has her own catering company, Zona Rosa, so half the fun was pulling out her extensive collection of china, candlesticks and other tabletop decor to create elaborate tablescapes. The vignette above is part of an “outdoor room” in Pizzo’s backyard under a grand trellis. ”Anna wanted everything to be fresh,” Monarch said. “That was the main thing and it had to feel like you were walking through Provence.” For lookiloos walking through the Willow Glen home tour in early May, they were greeted by the smells of  fresh bread and lavendar and lemons. 

As part of the house remodel, the Pizzos brought in designer Lori Kagan to update the kitchen, using Emperor Light marble for the countertops. (I wish I had succulents like that.) In the adjoining dining room, a closet was turned into a wet bar.

Monarch of Monarch Design and Studio also helped Pizzo with the master bedroom and bath. Some of Pizzo’s favorite things came from the Alameda Flea Market and other “funky vintage shops,” Monarch said.

  Monarch also helped with the interior of the Kouretas home on the tour last year. (see story below.)

How lovely is this? Check out the zebra print on the back of the blue silk. Yummy.

You might also enjoy these stories:

Design Inspiration:Big Remodel Maintains Homey Feel

Jose’s Tabletop Decor Inspired by Chinese Take-out

Here’s the complete slideshow:

.

Lately, I’ve become enamored with houses that are unassuming from the front,  but have a major ‘wow’ factor on the inside.

From the front of this white-washed Willow Glen cottage, you might expect a chopped-up floorplan.  The only feature on the facade that gives you a sense of what’s to come is the bright yellow front door. Walk inside and you’re flooded with openness and light. And you can see right through to the charming backyard.

Homeowner Stephanie Angeli, an  ”empty nester” who moved from San Francisco,  first saw the house with her sister. “We did an ‘Oh my God,’ when we went through it,” she said. “Every room was perfect.”

The house had been remodeled by the previous owner who added space and lots of windows on the back of the house, looking out to the courtyard. The sisters got in their car, did a U-turn, she said, and went to the realtor’s office to put down a deposit. The house was featured on the Willow Glen Home Tour earlier this month.

The kitchen is also a gem, with white Carrarra marble counter tops and a sink in the corner looking into the family room.

And the interior decor is lovely, from the the little vignette of green stemware in front of al painting on the kitchen counter, to a nicely-appointed front guest room and office. Carmen Grande of Willow Glen Home & Garden on Lincoln Avenue helped Stephanie with the furnishings and Steve Gilbert added charm to the courtyard.

Take a look at the slideshow and tell us what space you like the best.

Here’s the complete slideshow: