For Tami Korsos and her husband, Matt, their 6,000-square-foot St. Charles home has become much more than a place to live. Over the past five years, it has hosted baby and bridal showers, graduations, holiday parties and the everyday moments that become family memories. At Christmas, however, the house takes on a particularly theatrical personality when Korsos transforms her elaborate holiday vision into an immersive celebration of tradition, design and the season she has loved since childhood.
The St. Louis-area couple found the home almost by chance. Korsos, an interior designer and owner of The Rooming House in St. Charles, was scrolling through real estate listings during one of her son’s golf tournaments when she spotted the property. She sent the listing to Matt and promptly announced, “We’re buying this house.” He was less enthusiastic, having purchased their previous home only a year earlier. But Korsos knew almost immediately that this was the one. Through the living room’s towering 20-foot windows, she saw a lush, wooded landscape, while elegant, molded archways gave the interior an architectural character she found compelling.
The 1.2-acre property, in an established St. Charles neighborhood, offered the setting she wanted, but the lower level ultimately sealed the deal. A custom bar by Liston Design Build, a generous living area, guest bath and private guest suite with its own dedicated laundry room provided the combination of entertaining space and private retreat the couple had been seeking. “We put in an offer immediately, and the rest is history,” Korsos laughs.
The home had exceptional bones, but the couple wanted to infuse it with her own aesthetic. Korsos’s preference for calm, cohesive neutrals led her to paint the entire house Sherwin-Williams Snowbound, her go-to white. The couple remodeled the kitchen, added classic picture molding to the two-story entry and living room and created custom cabinetry in the primary bedroom, including two five-foot drawers specifically designed to hold bed pillows. That practical detail echoes Korsos’s design philosophy. “When I design a space, I always try to think practically about how we live,” she says, “making sure everything is as functional for everyday life as it is beautiful.”
They continued throughout the house, renovating the downstairs guest-suite bath, both upstairs bathrooms, the game room, laundry room and pantry. Remarkably, the couple completed about 99 percent of the work themselves. Korsos developed the design concepts, while she and Matt figured out how to execute them. The result is a home that reflects the same balance she brings to her professional work: beautiful, highly considered spaces designed around the realities of daily life. At Christmas, that practical sensibility gives way to something more exuberant.
The designer’s love of the holiday comes from her grandmother, who was legendary in the family for her Christmas celebrations. She kept a magnificent white flocked tree up all year, covered in pink poinsettias and ornaments, and hosted an extravagant Christmas Eve party, filling the dining room with sterling chafing dishes and enough food to feed an army. Korsos remembers sitting in the kitchen while her grandmother prepared for the celebration weeks in advance.
“When I was little, I dreamed of one day taking over Christmas Eve and throwing elaborate parties of my own,” she says. Years later, she has happily taken up that mantle. The couple hosts a custom-themed Christmas party each year, and this time the theme was “Christmas in New York,” bringing the glamour and romance of Manhattan to St. Charles.
Upstairs, Korsos reimagined the main living spaces as a tribute to the Plaza Hotel, translating its iconic elegance into a palette of gold, silver and sophisticated neutrals. Two towering trees—a 10-foot and a 12-foot—anchor the living area, taking advantage of the room’s generous scale and soaring windows. Softly illuminated garlands wind along the stair railing, intertwined with gold ornaments, extending the holiday composition vertically throughout the two-story space. “I wanted our guests to step inside and immediately feel the grandeur of multiple towering trees, just as you experience walking through the Plaza,” Korsos says.
In the dining room, a four-foot gingerbread house introduces a whimsical counterpoint to the more refined surroundings. It is the sort of unexpected detail that keeps the holiday scheme from feeling overly formal and gives guests something new to discover as they move through the house.
Downstairs, the mood changes entirely. The lower level becomes a stylized New York “subway,” and the inspiration shifts to the Ralph Lauren flagship store on Madison Avenue. Antique blue willow china, layers of classic plaids and arrangements of rich red roses and magnolias displayed in blue-and-white ginger jars create a more intimate, refined atmosphere.
The two levels offer distinctly different interpretations of New York, but Korsos ties them together through color, pattern, repetition and scale. The effect is less like a house decorated for Christmas than a house transformed for a grand occasion.
One element, however, appears throughout: a Christmas tree in every room. For Korsos, the abundance is not simply about decorating. It is about creating an experience that feels generous, personal and full of discovery—the same kind of holiday magic her grandmother created for her. “When we entertain, my ultimate goal is to craft an immersive, memorable experience where delightful little details wait around every single corner,” she says.
That philosophy has become part of the home itself. The renovations have made it distinctly theirs, while the holidays allow Korsos to layer in another expression of her personality, one rooted in family memories but continually reinvented. The house that began as an unexpected discovery has become the backdrop for traditions of their own, filled with the people, celebrations and details that give a home its meaning. “We love this house—it’s warm in the winter, cool in the summer and looks spectacular with Christmas lights,” Korsos says, borrowing a line from George Banks in Father of the Bride that feels particularly fitting here.
