It was love at first sight,” Jessica Goldman Srebnick says of the secluded Miami Beach house she bought in 2004, when she and husband Scott Srebnick were expecting their second child.

Goldman Srebnick, 37, a partner of Goldman Properties, the real estate empire founded by her father Tony Goldman, was captivated by the classic decor created by the house's previous owner, James Samson, an interior designer. She liked his taste so much that she bought nearly half of the furniture he had selected for the house and hired him to help her adapt it for the boisterous presence of young children.

The living room’s custom sofas by Le Jeune Fine Upholstery and pair of 1950s black leather wingback chairs surround a Nineteenth-century ottoman from Taylor Galleries. The round, white lacquer table was a Lincoln Road Antiques Market find. The 1940s Murano glass lamp is from Michel Contessa Antiques. The cream brushed-cotton drapes with brown velvet trim, from Marsh Industries, were custom designed. The Persian rug is from Amir Rug Gallery.

Glass-top coffee tables were removed from the living room and the house morphed into a more relaxed, informal space. But the initial changes were minor.

“We just fluffed,” Samson says.

In 2006, with a third son about to arrive, Goldman Srebnick embarked on an ambitious plan to expand the 1950 house from 5,600 square feet to 8,000, adding three bedrooms and a blazing blue playroom, where the children could wield their Jedi swords without wreaking havoc on the decor.

Srebnick, 42, left all of the aesthetic decisions to his wife.

“Scott was very supportive,” she says.

Samson appreciated his hands-off approach. “I have other clients where the husbands are very involved and it's not easy,” he says. “Jessica and I could go shopping and make decisions right there.”

“As a criminal defense lawyer,” he adds, “Scott's too busy to worry about pillows and wall color.

”Many homeowners dread major renovations, but Goldman Srebnick relished the prospect.

“Construction and design is my business,” she says. “Applying it to my home was a lot of fun.”

She hired Miami-based architect Ralph Choeff, whom she praises for his imaginative solutions for expanding and reconfiguring the house. “Ralph has a fantastic way of integrating old and new,” she says. “You'd never know from the inside or outside what we added.” Goldman Srebnick is similarly effusive about Greg Milopoulos, her contractor. “He was a complete professional and perfectionist, focused on giving me first-class quality,” she says.

The Srebnicks’ sons sword fight on Togo chairs and an ottoman in Alcantara Bohemian blue from Ligne Roset.

The group dynamic of client, architect, contractor and decorator was harmonious from the start. “To achieve really great things you need to have a team,” Goldman Srebnick says, “and everyone was extraordinary in their abilities.” When logistic problems arose during the project, Goldman Srebnick invited the team to work out solutions together.

“Jessica was the ringleader,” Samson says. “When we met to hammer things out, she always had lunch waiting for us.”
Born and raised in New York City, she moved to Miami Beach 10 years ago to begin an apprenticeship with her father, a leading player in the redevelopment of South Beach and Manhattan's SoHo. Her first project involved working with Todd Oldham, on the design for The Hotel on South Beach. In the process she fell in love with the city.

“Miami is a magnificent place to live,” she says. Much has changed about the place she remembers from childhood visits. “We've seen a real evolution. When we started buying real estate here in 1986, Miami Beach was about crack houses and old people. Today it's very cosmopolitan, with fabulous restaurants, hotels and shopping, and great night life.”

Almost everything in the house was purchased within a few miles of the residence. “Miami's become such an incredible resource for design,” Goldman Srebnick says. “You can find everything here, every quality and every price point.”

She enjoyed the adventure of combing through local antiques stores with Samson. “One of the things I love about Jim is his confidence in mixing things that are beautiful and expensive with things that are beautiful and inexpensive,” she says.

Some combinations of objects have not changed since Goldman Srebnick's first visit. She’s particularly fond of one vignette in the dining room, where Samson placed an inexpensive Chippendale-style chair from the Lincoln Road flea market next to a French Nineteenth-century chest of drawers and mirror. The effect is elegant and unfussy.

Similarly, the walls of the huge living room remain chocolate brown, just as they were when Samson lived there. “I would never think of painting a large room such a bold color,” Goldman Srebnick says, “but it's soothing and warm, and a great contrast to the lush greenery outside the windows.”

	A Mercury lighting fixture from Baker and a painted black cow head from Base Annex add a touch of whimsy in the kitchen.

With new furniture and art, the overall effect is quite different. Six dramatic large-scale photographs of horses dominate one living room wall. They are part of a series called The Wild Horses of Sable Island by Roberto M. Dutesco, a New York photographer whose work Goldman Srebnick discovered when her father bought one of his pieces to adorn the lobby of 25 Bond, a New York luxury building the family is developing. With titles such as Love, Fury and Pride, the photographs were taken on an island off Nova Scotia that is populated only by wild horses.

“I flipped out,” Goldman Srebnick says. “I thought they were so beautiful, wild and intimate.”

In revamping the house, the couple’s overall goal was to create a home that was simultaneously comfortable, sophisticated and child-friendly for sons James, 5; Andrew, 3; and Mack, 15 months—not to mention their children’s friends.

Goldman Srebnick enlarged the kitchen to create a cozy banquette for family dining adjacent to the new playroom and just a few steps away from the swimming pool—a perfect arrangement for active kids. Samson came up with the idea of upholstering the banquette in a cheery raspberry-and-white umbrella fabric.

“It's great for the kids because it's indestructible,” he says.

A large ceramic cow's head—one of Samson's many finds—is mounted on a wall and greets everyone who enters the kitchen. “They call it Bessie,” he notes.

Amid the fun-house atmosphere of the kitchen, it's surprising to find a stately Biedermeier sofa, circa 1870, with crimson cushions. “It's somewhat luxurious,” Goldman Srebnick says, “but I'm all about living with and enjoying antiques. If kids put chocolate on it, I don't care—there are enough things to worry about in the world.”

Photographs of smiling faces—her children, friends, relatives and exuberant wedding pictures—congregate on the wall above the s

Goldman Srebnick lies on a Nineteenth-century Biedermeier sofa from Michel Contessa Antiques.

ofa, up the stairs and in hallways. “We have photographs everywhere,” Goldman Srebnick says. “For me, it's a way of keeping our friends and family close.” The clusters of pictures wholesome agenda.

“Home is a place to be enjoyed,” she says. “I wanted this to be a really happy home.”

In that spirit, the new playroom is painted a deep blue that reminds Samson of the color of the Greek seas. The walls match the intense color of the carpet and four Ligne Roset Togo chairs, which can be jumped on, reclined on, or dragged about to double as castles for epic battles fought with plastic swords.

“There are no sharp corners in that room,” Samson says. “She doesn't have to worry about anything.”
Tall hedges surround the Srebnicks’ property, creating a green cocoon around what certainly seems to be an idyll of family life. “We're never leaving this house,” Goldman Srebnick says. “It really suits us.”