A stately home that marries the 19th and 21st centuries

In 2003, George Funkhouser and Susan Nitka drove to Bridgeton, N.J., where George, who buys and sells precious metals and antiques, was going to meet with a client.

At the time, the couple were living in Philadelphia's Port Richmond section in a home she had inherited from her parents. They had been together for a decade and were considering buying a larger house.

That day in Bridgeton, they drove down streets lined with mansions built in the 19th century, when the city was a center for industry in South Jersey.

Susan and George spied a "For Sale" sign on the lawn of an 1898 gambrel-roofed Queen Anne and arranged with a real estate agent to see the house.

"George has always been infatuated with Victorian homes," Susan says. Though the place needed work, she knew they would buy it when "George turned around to me like a little boy at Christmas and said, 'Do you believe this house?' "

The couple, who married in 2004, gradually restored the mansion's late-19th-century features and added new ones, including a spacious glass sunroom and a fanciful backyard water park.

With the help of old photos, they replaced the porch that had been removed in the 1950s and restored the entrance with French doors and a pair of stained-glass windows.

A new addition, consisting of a porte cochere topped with a Juliet balcony and a gambrel roof, houses dressing and exercise rooms for the second-floor master suite.

George stripped white paint off exterior cedar shingles, then stained them deep red. The work was so labor-intensive, he says, "I couldn't hire someone to do it."

He also refurbished and repaired all the windows, estimating that there are more than 30.

Wood trim was painted butterscotch and green.

Inside, Holly Fisher of Media installed burgundy, green, and gold striped and patterned Bradbury & Bradbury art wallpaper in the parlor, sitting room, and dining room. George supplied crystal chandeliers, carpets for the parquet floors, and period furniture such as the baroque breakfront in the dining room and the Victorian settee in the parlor.

Being in the antiques business, he was always on the lookout for pieces for the house, Susan says: "He would make purchases years before he was ready to use things."

Upstairs, tin ceilings were installed in the crimson-papered master bedroom and in the library. Barrister bookcases have beveled-glass doors to keep out dust. A vintage wedding dress is displayed in one of the guest rooms.

In the 1960s, previous owners expanded the kitchen and added a family room. The kitchen was updated shortly before George and Susan purchased the house. Susan replaced the backsplash and a countertop and hung her collection of copper pots from the ceiling beams.

A two-tiered fountain with a bird motif provides a water feature in front of the house.

In back, George trucked in boulders and rocks from the Poconos to landscape the existing swimming pool. Water now cascades down a hill of rocks into an additional ornamental pool, where Susan's water lilies float. A stone maiden frolics in another pool with two graceful herons.

A stone alligator lurks nearby. A Komodo dragon suns on a boulder while a cougar peers out from behind the waterfall.

In nice weather, George and Susan prepare meals in an outdoor stainless-steel kitchen and dine under a stone-columned cabana.

Susan, 58, and George, 63, now both work in Bridgeton. A former investment-firm operations manager, she teaches fifth grade in the local public school district. He bought the house next door and operates his business there.

They have become active in the community, opening their home for the Christmas tour sponsored by the Bridgeton Historical Society.

In 2011, their Queen Anne earned a preservation award from the Bridgeton Historic District Commission.

Susan gives her husband credit for the mansion's restoration.

"George is a visionary," she says. "He had a picture of the end result in his mind."