The Wall Street Journal

On a leafy lane in Audubon Park, Louisville, sits a house that looks like it could have once belonged to Rapunzel. With a fairytale turret and Dutch Colonial Revival architecture, the home stands apart from its neighbors. But when Heather and Stefan Rumancik, both 43, purchased the 1930s home in 2009 for $225,000, it was a far cry from its present-day avatar. "We bought the house from its second owners, who had owned it since the 1940s, but the home itself hadn’t been updated in thirty years," says Mrs. Rumancik, a competitive intelligence executive at a pharmaceutical company, who shares the home with Mr. Rumancik and their eleven-year-old daughter, Adrienne.

On a leafy lane in Audubon Park, in Louisville, Ky., sits a house that looks like it could have once belonged to Rapunzel. With a fairy-tale turret and Dutch Colonial Revival architecture, the home stands apart from its neighbors. But when Heather and Stefan Rumancik, both 43, purchased the 1930s home in 2009 for $225,000, it was a far cry from its present-day version.

“We bought the house from its second owners, who had owned it since the 1940s, but the home itself hadn’t been updated in 30 ye

When they purchased the modest-sized, woodland house from an interior designer in 1999 for $570,000, businessman David Watts and his wife, Nancy—aged 59 and 58 respectively—fell in love with its natural wood finishes, especially the hewn cedar walls and beautiful chestnut beams in the family room. Over the years, they complemented the rustic elements with additions of their own, including naturally shed elk and deer antlers from their property, repurposed as cabinet hardware. “Yet, while the other spaces largely echoed the woods around, the white kitchen stuck out like a sore thumb,” says Mrs. Watts of the Towson, Maryland property.

When they purchased the modest-sized, woodland house in Towson, Md., from an interior designer in 1999 for $570,000, businessman David Watts and his wife, Nancy Watts—aged 59 and 58, respectively—fell in love with its natural wood finishes, especially the hewed cedar walls and beautiful chestnut beams in the family room. Over the years, they complemented the rustic elements with additions of their own, including naturally shed elk and deer antlers from their property, repurposed as cabinet hardw

When clinical psychotherapist Elizabeth McIngvale and her oil-and-gas financier husband, Matthew Mackey, both in their 30s, decided to construct a 6,000-square-foot home in Houston’s historic Houston Heights neighborhood, they knew their priorities. “We wanted the interior to be a tranquil haven far removed from the city,” says Dr. McIngvale. Soon after, the couple enlisted interior designer William W. Stubbs, in his 60s, who had served three generations of Dr. McIngvale’s family, and who had known her since she was a little girl.

When clinical psychotherapist Elizabeth McIngvale and her oil-and-gas financier husband, Matthew Mackey, both in their 30s, decided to construct a 6,000-square-foot home in Houston’s historic Houston Heights neighborhood, they knew their priorities. “We wanted the interior to be a tranquil haven far removed from the city,” says Dr. McIngvale. Soon after, the couple enlisted interior designer William W. Stubbs, in his 60s, who had served three generations of Dr. McIngvale’s family, and who had kn