Lake house redo mixes modern with antique _ and puts a focus on function and family.(Knight Ridder Newspapers)

Byline: Meda Kessler

It started with a 200-year-old table.

While vacationing in Aspen, Charles and Barbara Cummings spotted a lovely but large table in an antiques store. He wanted it. She wasn't sure where they would put it (it seats 10!). True love won in the end: He loved the table, she loved him, the table became theirs.

Our love story almost ended there, however. The table sat in storage as the couple contemplated what to do with their '70s-era house on a bluff overlooking Eagle Mountain Lake in Fort Worth, Texas.

With a blended family of seven children and five grandchildren plus the couple's beloved Weimaraner, the Cummingses needed to make the 2,200-square-foot home the focal point of family gatherings.

"My style is terribly modern and his is traditional, but we both wanted something functional," she says.

A tear-out of the interior of the native-stone house had already begun when the couple called upon the talents of the creative team of Mike Schomburg (landscaping) and Dale Stryker (interiors) of Strings, who had also seen the table.