The bold red color of Kathy Savitt and Michael Lennon's parlor is echoed in the neighboring foyer and living room. The parlor is used both to receive guests and as a family room. The armchairs belonged to Savitt's grandmother.

The 6,000-square-foot structure before them was strewn with crumbling bricks, shattered stained-glass windows, layers of linoleum, even asbestos-covered pipes.

"When my Mom saw it, she got teary," Savitt recalls. "She kind of doubtfully said, trying to be supportive: 'I hope you'll be very happy here.'"

But Savitt, who had remodeled three of her earlier homes, saw possibilities in the spacious 1907 Capitol Hill house. Within the four floors there were plenty of rooms for raising kids and playing host to house guests — eight bedrooms and five bathrooms. It had good architectural lines: high ceilings, rooms that flowed from one to the next. Gracious touches were evident: large, leaded-glass bay windows; detailed molding; inlaid floors.

"It was an awesome family home that was crying for someone to bring it back," Savitt says.

Many hours and dollars later, their home is now "a beacon for friends and family," says Savitt, president of a public-relations firm. It has plenty of play space for the children (12-year-old Megan and 2-year-old Isabel); each floor even has a play/family room. And it has the entertaining amenities needed by Savitt and her husband Lennon, an investment banker.

Savitt and Lennon collect Northwest art and display it prominently in their house. Paintings by artists including Fay Jones, left, and Christopher Kroehler, right, enliven a basement corridor.
The couple completely remodeled the basement, which includes a large recreation room housing a pool table, pinball machine and bar. Lennon's bar (Lenny was his nickname in college) has beer on tap.

They host informal dinners every other Sunday for six to 14 people. Every six to eight weeks, they gather some two dozen friends to dine. Both Savitt and Lennon are from the East Coast, and friends and family visit often. The couple also hosts two large gatherings each year, for Labor Day and Christmas. The Christmas party, a formal, evening-attire affair for 350, typically features a bar on each floor, dinner under a big tent in the back yard, and entertainers such as a caroling group and handwriting analysts.

"The house has to be able to rock," Savitt says. "And it has to be able to make 25 people feel like they're at home."

Working with contractors Bundy Design & Construction and interior designer Anne Fisher Associates, Savitt and Lennon focused on restoring the elegance of the rundown house. It wasn't easy. "There's not a wall, window, door, hinge, knob, fixture, pipe, ceiling, surface or system that hasn't been completely redone," Savitt says.

Furniture and decor were chosen to honor the house's turn-of-the-century architecture and charm. The dining-room table, coffee table, chairs on the first floor and antique beds were made from about 1900 to 1915. Late-Victorian high-back couches in the living room echo the theme.

The couple also wanted to play up the flow of the house's rooms. They wanted to form a series of small, intimate rooms, tied together by function and aesthetics — a bit like suites, each with its own look, yet with elements that connect one room to the next.

Except for the basement, which Savitt and Lennon remodeled from one large cavernous space into five rooms and a bathroom, most of the changes were design-related, not structural. Each set of rooms — each suite, in effect — was painted in varying shades from the same color family. They put vibrant colors on the walls — reds, purples, mustards — for intimacy, warmth and excitement.

It took four months to restore masonry outside the house. The balcony on the second floor is accessible through the main bedroom, and on warm days Savitt and Lennon have breakfast there.

The front door, foyer, parlor and living room, which form a receiving area, are bound by a bold red color scheme. Fireplaces in the parlor and living room are tiled in varying shades of green. There's even a collection of buffalo figurines in the rather formal parlor — stemming from Savitt's promise to Lennon that if he moved from Buffalo to Seattle, there would "always be a little buffalo in the house."

The kids often play in the more informal living room, setting up their dollhouses and doll furniture on a low ledge by the fireplace. When company arrives, the toys go into the drawers under the ledge and a sitting cushion is placed on top. ("We receive guests in the parlor," Savitt says. "We play with them in the living room.") Two paintings by Northwest artist Terry Turrell adorn the walls. (Savitt and Lennon are collectors of Northwest art. Paintings by artists such as Fay Jones and Gaylen Hansen figure prominently throughout the house.)

Dark-trimmed hardwood floors connect the parlor and living room to the spacious dining room, where a 1902 oak table seats 16. A window seat that Savitt had built alongside bay windows accommodates more guests during buffet dinners.

The four floors of the house, while all designed with entertaining and family in mind, serve different functions. The main floor is the public area. The second floor holds the family's bedrooms. The third floor is made for guests; the basement for recreation.

In the dining room, rows of friends' and family members' photos adorn the wall - appropriate for a room that features a 1902 table that, with leaves, seats 16 and a window seat built to accommodate more guests during buffet dinners. The restored chandelier and moldings are original to the house.

On the second floor, the girls' rooms form a suite, in varying shades of purple. Megan's dusky purple room leads to a light-filled, covered sun porch painted in a lighter purple. The kids' "hideaway" — with a purple beanbag chair, TV, piano and rocking chair — is connected to Isabel's room, painted in lavender.

Savitt and Lennon's bedroom is more elegant, in shades of burgundy and cream. Like the kitchen table, the headboard of their bed is also an antique wooden door.

A large framed mural of family and friends sits prominently on the third story, appropriate for a floor with three guest rooms. A small laundry room even lets guests do their own wash. Savitt's office, with an extra bed, features a collection of maps and globes to commemorate places she and Lennon visited on their dates.

Most of the rooms on the third floor are painted in sage green and shades of mustard, from the sedate taupe of Savitt's office to the vibrant, almost umber tones in the kids' playroom. A pillar covered in chalkboard is surrounded by bright toys. A purple-and-green trundle bed stands in one corner; a chaise lounge in another; the mirror and light fixtures have frames and shades shaped like metallic crowns.

The headboard of Savitt's and Lennon's bed is actually a door from another turn-of-the-century house on Capitol Hill. The owners of the other house were remodeling and sold the door.

The basement rooms are tied together by dark woods and purple-and-sage walls. Oak for the floor was shipped in from Denmark. An exercise room is equipped with treadmill, stationary bike and a Pilates machine.

The most prominent basement room, the game room, is home to a bar (Budweiser on tap, a mini-fridge and dishwasher below), a pool table, pinball machine, TV and a "Lenny's Bar" neon sign (Lenny was Lennon's nickname in college). A sliver of crumbling brick against the wall — now used as the backdrop for pool cue hangers — is the only part of the original basement surface that remains.

The game room, like the rest of the house, "goes instantly from a great room to entertain to a great room for the kids," Savitt says. "We wanted this whole house to be a Valentine for our friends and family, so they would always want to come."

Janet I. Tu is a Seattle Times staff reporter. Benjamin Benschneider is a staff photographer for Pacific Northwest magazine.