Over the years, she has maintained many details that she believes were original to the house, from the marble bathroom sinks and stained-glass windows to the large pocket doors and carved wooden fretwork.

WSJ: Bed-and-Breakfast With Lively Talk

The flat-roofed, rectangular glass house, with white travertine marble floors and decks, floats elegantly on steel supports along the banks of the Fox River in Plano, Ill.

FORBES: Un-private Houses

She prefers Streatham, further south in London, where she could buy a palace for the money gentrifiers are keen to pay for her house, with its original cornicing and marble fireplaces.

ECONOMIST: Changing London

Every corner of Upper House spells luxury, from the glass and marble lobby to the sleek rooms with rain showers and sculptures.

BBC: Mini guide to Hong Kong

The rest of the house has high-end features like Italian marble, mahogany cabinetry, onyx slab flooring, wine and piano room, two pools, billiard room and solar power-generating system.

FORBES: Ultimate Garages (Cars, Too!) for Father's Day

Set in a restored relic that overlooks the Douro, the eight rooms at Guest House Douro have gorgeous wooden floors, queen beds and marble baths.

BBC: Mini guide to Porto and the Douro, Portugal

The typical Viennese coffee house -- an elegant institution with high ceilings, marble-top tables and a stack of newspapers to make one linger over an impeccable black brew with a customary glass of water -- may be more famously known than its Ukrainian cousin, but to trace back the origin of the communal coffee space, you have to go to Lviv, a Medieval city in western Ukraine.

BBC: Tracing the coffee house revolution to its Ukrainian roots

They built a three-story house in a nice neighborhood, with 12-foot ceilings, marble floors and teak woodwork.

NPR: India's Doctors Returning Home