Yours, Mine and Ours: A Beach House for Two Families

Pillows in modern prints top cottage-comfy seating wearing washable white slipcovers. Dawn likes to contrast traditional elements, such as an old beat-up wood pedestal dining table and Shaker-style kitchen cabinets, with an ultramodern Lucite coffee table and a funky zebra-striped rug. "I like the juxtaposition of city with beach. It's a little edgy," she says.

Judy had long admired Dawn's sense of style, so she was happy to give her friend the design reins for their reinvigorated beachside place. "This house is decorated so differently from my home in Illinois, which is much more traditional," Judy says. "Up here, it's freer and cleaner lines. It's living in a much more simplified way. And that is in itself a vacation."

Pictured: Stock kitchen cabinetry is budget-friendly and smart in a house full of active kids and summer fun. "If a door breaks or gets stained or scratched, I can take it off the hinges and get a new door front," Dawn says.