In the 10 months it took to build this house from the ground up, a lot happened in the Wetmore family. Diane’s mother, the matriarch of the family, died, and her daughter got married. What she realized then was just how important it was that this new home become the center, the gathering place, for the family.

And to Diane and Ray, whose four grown daughters all attended St. Martin of Tours, that meant big, open spaces for entertaining, both inside and out. And that starts at the majestic front door, a work of iron art with wavy glass windows that open behind it, letting the California breeze blow from the front all the way to the glass doors that slide into the wall in the back. The family graciously opened their home for the Rose Garden Homes Tour this fall.

Ray is a commercial masonry contractor and the home that Diane describes as part Arizona, part Florida and part Hawaii needed some signature stonework. With the help of architect Chris Spaulding and designer Susan Powell, they created a stone alcove that can be glimpsed from the entryway as well as a stone-covered stove hood. Even the risers on the curving staircase are covered in a distinctive tile to add interest. The living room ceiling soars two-stories high, with windows upon windows to let light in. The front room was designed as a “mancave” with leather sofas, a wet bar, stone fireplace and vintage wine barrels. Limestone tile floors make a seamless transition from the living room through the wall of windows(that disappear when opened) to the covered patio, complete with a Tuscan-style dining table and plans for a full-service barbecue area.

With a gracious master bedroom downstairs, the upstairs is reserved for family, including a nursery for the Wetmore’s grandchildren.

“Everyone comes here and stays here,” Diane said. “It was built to bring the family together.”

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Feel that crispness in the air? It’s home tour season! And Lookiloos is giving away two pairs of tickets to the 2011 Rose Garden Homes Tour in San Jose this weekend, Oct. 14-15. See below how to win! And take a look at the facades of the homes on tour below, and just imagine what’s inside!

Don’t you want to go inside this meticulously-restored Neoclassical Victorian, shown above? There’s some amazing salvaged stained glass, high ceilings, and a spectacular master bedroom, which had been an attic. How about this one below, a 1930 Spanish-style family home with remodeled kitchen and bathrooms, inlaid with special vintage-inspired tiles?

Check out this one below” A newly-built Tuscan home with exceptional stonework and a wall of windows that slide open to the garden. It’s amazing.

The traditional ranch house below has amazing woodworking details and hand-painted finishes.

 These four lovely homes, plus an elegant Victorian garden  will be featured Oct. 15-16 during the 16th annual Rose Garden Homes Tour in San Jose, benefiting St. Martin of Tours School.

Gather your friends, put on your walking shoes and enjoy an afternoon in one of San Jose’s finest neighborhoods. Afterward, indulge yourself with a gourmet luncheon and browse through a gift boutique in the gardens of a rescued and lovingly restored Italianate Victorian.

 When: Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 15-16, 2011. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Where: Tour begins at 2017 University Way, San Jose

Tickets: $30 in advance. $35 at the door. Lunch tickets must be ordered by Oct. 11, $13.

Tickets may be purchased through the website at www.rosegardenhomestour.com , Not Too Shabby at 481 S. Bascom Ave. San Jose; Willow Glen Home and Garden on Lincoln Avenue,  and Vintage and Vogue at 241 E. Campbell Avenue, Campbell.

Benefiting St. Martin of Tours School, San Jose.

Website: www.rosegardenhomestour.com

 To win the tickets, leave a comment on our lookiloos facebook page (we’re having a technical problem here) and tell us why you want to go and we’ll pick a pair of winners!

Photos by Marie McEnery.

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:

So, have you been bit yet? You know by the Royal Wedding Bug? My friends are dropping like flies. Facebook profile pics have been changed, apps have been downloaded and alarm clocks have been set. I have to admit when Diana Spencer married Prince Charles, I was all over that. We didn’t have the internet and my parents didn’t even have cable. Do you know how hard it was to get my information?

I’ve gotten some photos of the of Buckingham Palace and thought I’d share. The opulence of the rooms is breathtaking—further confirming I had to have been switched at birth.

Using red silk damask, the walls of the State Dining Room make a proper background for the portraits of sovereigns from throughout history.

A portrait of Edward VII’s wife Queen Alexandra hangs in the White Drawing Room, apparently it is the grandest of the state rooms and it has views of the gardens. There is a secret door leading to private rooms to allow for a discreet Royal entrance. I’d like one of those—no more awkward entrances. The main focus of the reception will be the picture gallery, where the wedding cake a traditional multi-tiered fruit cake will be on display surrounded with works by Canaletto, Rembrandt and Rubens.

The lavishly appointed White Drawing Room will be one of the rooms used during the wedding reception. Can you imagine standing in the middle of it all?

The finest crystal chandeliers hang from the ornate ceiling of the Blue Drawing Room. I believe I’m going to start refering to the rooms in my own home this way—”Get that skateboard out of the Gold Living Room”! It works—doesn’t it?

You can purchase tickets either day at the ticket house 3245 Bryant Street, Palo Alto or online here.

Leave a comment here and the winner will be announced on Thursday evening.

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:

Thierry, who was born and raised in Paris and spent weekends scouting
flea markets and antique shops with his father, decorated the dining
room for the Summit League Homes for the Holidays tour in early
December.
“I wanted to mix earthy and a casual feeling with a really formal
environment,” Thierry said.
The inspiring artwork was a painted piece of carved mahogany that a
friend lent him from artist John Byers. It rests on a credenza at the
end of the room, with a pair of modern lamps in the foreground.
To add drama, he used a zebra skin rug as a table runner layered over
a piece of pale burlap he custom made with a Greek key border. He also
found some white dishes with stark black geometric patterns.

Perhaps from his Parisian roots, Thierry loves to bring the outside in
with vintage garden urns (adding metallic orbs and snowglobes on top
for sparkle).

The antique garden credenza, the base from the 18th century, has a
modern cement top. It’s one of his favorite pieces.
He kept the flowers simple, he said, using paperwhites on the
credenzas, and adding mini Christmas trees and cabbage plants on the
table.

For whimsy, he had a custom topiary created to look like his Norwich
Terrier “Winston,” stuffed it with moss and placed it in the center of
the table.
“Winston is such a huge part of my life. I just adore that dog, so I
put him right there” he said. “It’s pure whimsy, quirky, different and
unexpected.”

As he puts it, “I had fun in that room.”

If you’re looking to add fun to your own rooms, and want Thierry’s
help, you can contact him here:
Thierry Buisson Interiors
thierryinteriors@gmail.com.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Designers and florists all lent their talents to this home. Mary Ann Scolari Interior Design in Saratoga decorated the entry hall, while Elle D’Lin Design was responsible for the living room.

Four Seasons of Style in Los Gatos appointed the office  and hallway. The family room was decorated by Inspired Interiors & Design. Judith M. Floral Design filled it with flowers, while the tree was decorated by Jeff Fiorito of Scotts Valley.

The sunny cook’s kitchen that opens to the family room was made festive by Maria’s France-Italy-England in Los Gatos .

The powder room was glammed up by Seashell Reflections of California and the dining room got special attention from The Fat Robin-La Mesa Linens.

The girl’s and boy’s room, which Lookiloos already featured, were appointed by Chris Gomo.

The house is also coming on the market. For more information, call John Faylor at Coldwell Banker Previews International at 408-605-8133 or email him at j.faylor@att.net or see more details of this home at www.JFTeam.com.

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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: