Foreign Intrigue -- A Capitol Hill Couple Lets The Paint Run Off The Canvas And Gets A Mediterranean Look

ELENA KORAKIANITOU-PORS IS A painter, but she doesn't confine her artistry to the studio.

"Give me a surface, and it's painted," says the artist. "I even paint the frames of my glasses when I get bored with the color."

Elena's biggest canvas to date has been her Capitol Hill home. Purchased four years ago with her husband, artist-turned-attorney Tom Pors, the 1926 residence was ideally located, but not very inspiring.

Armed with paint and plenty of pluck, the pair turned the flat, putty-colored walls into rich, moody surfaces that evoke the earthy ancestry of the Mediterranean. Fine antiques combine with thrift-shop finds (some transformed with paint as well) to produce a traditional home that's anything but old-fashioned.

The couple drew their inspiration from their travels to Italy and Elena's native Greece. There, it's not uncommon for a family to live in the same house for hundreds of years. "You see layers and layers of paint chipping off, and they love it," Elena says. "They respect it, because each color and each layer reminds them which generation lived in the house before."

The owners tried to instill that same sense of history in their own house, starting with the dining room. Tom took a chisel to the walls, blemishing the surface with some well-placed chinks. "Putting a few cracks in made it look older and lived in, and gave it some warmth," he explains.

They dabbed the walls and ceiling with yellow paint (changed to green during Elena's pregnancy, when yellow made her nauseous) and replaced the dining table with a desk, some chairs, a bookshelf and a piano for son Pavlos, 13. "We like to use every room of the house every day," explains Elena. "How often do you use a formal dining room?"

The owners moved the dining table into the living room, placing it in front of a newly installed set of French doors. They painted the walls here, as well, layering color on color to produce a burnished gold patina. The ceiling is dappled with patches of pale ocher, while the cove is painted a mottled green.

To produce the patchwork finish, the Porses work quickly, layering the paints in a single area before moving on to the next. All the work is done with rags and sponges. The couple even attacked the fireplace, slathering the tile surround with Fixall, and then wiping the excess away, to give the surface a more rusticated appearance. Streaks of paint enhance the hand-crafted look.

"We never know right away what we're going to do," says Elena. "We come up with an inspiration, and then we go ahead and work with it."

For the kitchen, the inspiration came in the form of an earthenware plate from Crete. Elena was so taken with the colors and patterns of the Byzantine design that she crafted some matching tiles from clay. She cut the squares by hand, to assure an irregular appearance, and affixed them to the walls and backsplash.

Instead of springing for a new refrigerator, Elena simply took paintbrush in hand and applied a Byzantine design to the old one. "People look at it and say, `I can't believe that you did this!' " she exclaims.

"It's as though a refrigerator is a sacred object and people can't touch it or decorate it," marvels Tom. "Who gave them that idea?"

In the romantic master bedroom, gauzy white fabric caresses the bed and windows, filtering the sunlight as it illuminates the murky, iridescent walls. The wall treatment happened almost by accident. After Elena stripped off the old grasscloth, patches of paper remained. She painted the surface with copper pigment, then oxidized the finish before applying a top coat of paint. The verdigris finish still shows through, lending the walls a rich, burnished glow.

Elena decorated the closet doors with color photocopies of old masters, to which she playfully affixed head shots of Tom and herself. She repeated the same technique on a $19 dresser, blending photocopies of landscapes with the surrounding paint, so the pictures look like they were painted on.

Elena enjoys painting old pieces of furniture. Most of the chairs in the kitchen, den and living room cost less than $10 at the Salvation Army. Elena simply painted the frames, or applied new fabrics on top of the old.

She paid $50 for the vintage gramophone cabinet in the living room, then painted the piece and applied oval photocopies to the front, to replicate inlaid wood. The dining table next to it originally sported a plastic-laminate top. She painted a wood finish over it, and stenciled an ivy border around the edges. Few visitors would guess the table cost $40.

"If you blend expensive pieces with pieces like this, you'll never tell," the homeowner advises. She paired the dining table with 150-year-old walnut chairs and a 19th-century Danish hutch, allowing the quality of these pieces to elevate the other furnishings in the room.

The Porses spared no expense on the front yard. They tore out the lawn and the old picket fence to create an intimate, European-style courtyard paved with squares of bluestone and surrounded by a juniper hedge. Visitors enter through an ornate gate fabricated by Tom from ironwork imported from Singapore.

In the back yard they put in pea-gravel paths bordered by serpentine flower beds. The results are particularly attractive when seen from Elena's studio: a sunny, cluttered space carved out of the old single-car garage.

Despite their seemingly endless gifts, the Porses insist that anyone can do what they've done.

"There's no secret to it," asserts Elena. "If you have the will, you can do it."

Seattle writer Fred Albert reports regularly on home design for Pacific and other regional magazines. Benjamin Benschneider is a Seattle Times photographer.