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Coming home felt strange for Paulajane D'Amato.

Walking up the front steps of a neatly kept four-bedroom home on Suffolk Avenue in Ventnor, the grown-up daughter of Paul "Skinny" D'Amato stopped mid-step.

"The awning is wonderful," she purred to a companion, looking up at the new canvas overhanging the porch. To D'Amato, who grew up at the address, the so-called addition felt strikingly familiar.

"It was that shade of orange when Skinny lived here."

Unlike many home re-dos, this year's Show House at the Shore wasn't just interested in radically remodeling one lucky home.

In this case, the house in question once belonged to Skinny D'Amato - owner of the 500 Club nightclub, who ran with Rat Packers and consorted with celebrities.

And the 18 designers who took on the project, as part of the charity fundraiser, knew they had a dizzying brief: remodel the home for the current owners, Mary Ann and Rick Lucas, while deciding how to handle the house's famed and sometimes notorious past.

To reveal that retro history - or tile over it with mosaic tile and shag carpet?

"We started from an interesting place this year," said Julie Reses, president of the Ruth Newman Shapiro Cancer & Heart Fund, which benefits four local hospitals every year with the show house event, sponsored by The Press of Atlantic City. "Every house has history - and this one has more history than normal."

As owner of Atlantic City's famed 500 Club, D'Amato became one of the anchors of the Rat Pack scene. As a young girl, Paulajane remembers Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr. and Dean Martin hanging out in her backyard.

"We had chaise lounges out there," she described. "And those guys were just always around," she said.

Patio concrete slabs show the celebrity handprints that once cartwheeled in front of the 500 Club.

Family members remember Christmas parties where Sinatra would take a moment amid the holiday to telephone Skinny D'Amato with best wishes.

But there were tragic moments too. In 1977, Skinny D'Amato's son, Angelo, took a plea bargain and served little jail time after admitting killing a man in the family basement.

And for all that, the project, themed around "La Dolce Vita," turns a spotlight on a home that had become, in most people's memories, secluded.

"I'm going to be honest - I didn't know it was here where he lived," explained Danielle McDonald, a Margate-based designer who transformed the kitchen, knocking through a side wall to create a shared bar area leading into the dining room. "And it's a generation thing, because my parents absolutely would."

Many of the newest design touches drew on the period of the 1950s and 1960s, the last time the house hosted these larger-than-life celebrities.

"People ask, why have four chairs in a guest bedroom?" explained designer Joseph Tenaglia of his space. "But Sinatra stayed right here. And what we know is he liked to entertain in his own room." Around a kidney-bean-shaped table, he says, "You can imagine late-night drinks, late-night conversation."

And then there's the basement, where designers Bill and Michele Collins undertook a remarkable overhaul - from dingy space to suave gaming den, complete with poker and cards tables and a working vintage slot machine.

"I definitely researched the room's past," Bill Collins explained, of renovating the erstwhile crime scene. "It's something that happened in the house at a particular time and moment."

But when he first met family members, he said, he was careful not even to make overt mention of the room.

"It was only as recent as five weeks ago, when Paulajane was here, and I sort of said, 'We're making fantastic progress on the basement,' and she asked if she could see it."

For many designers, the challenge was to adapt the past in a way that made room for the future.

"You have to remember, this will be used by a family," explained Chas Scholtz, who used his skills to create a decidedly modern upstairs bedroom for a teen girl.

The memories of two families - past and future - is a lot for a space to carry.

But when Paulajane D'Amato, a 500 Club pin prominent on her yellow suit, stepped downstairs to the den, she took stock of the plush furnishings before coming to rest on a new wall mural - a facsimile of a 500 Club flyer showing Dean Martin's winking silhouette.

"Spectacular," she said, slightly under her breath. "That's a great way to remember it."

E-mail Juliet Fletcher:

JFletcher@pressofac.com

Room by room

Living room: Wooden wicker hooded armchair sets the tone for the room by John Kelly, punctuated by glass Buddha ornaments and D'Amato family pictures in black and white.

Lounge: A classy cocktail lounge by Alicia Brown-Kosko takes its cue from a French poster on the wall, showing Anita Ekberg in Fellini's "La Dolce Vita."

Dining room: Designer and family friend Robert Wilson featured a chandelier made from white coral. The dinner table is adorned with the family's own china.

Kitchen: The knocking through of a dividing wall, envisioned by designer Danielle McDonald, gives a ready-made bar space between the kitchen and dining room.

Master bedroom: A zebra-stripe bureau picked by Marcy Dash Friedman strikes an exotic note amid other black-and-white touches.

Bedroom: Where Frank Sinatra stayed, Joseph Tenaglia Jr. adds lit-up tanks displaying wooden branches and a rare teak sink in the adjoining bathroom.

Back Room: It may be tiny, but this nook of a lounge boasts a retro orange fireplace, picked by designer Scott Eccard, and a poster-size shot of Sinatra's mugshot.

Game room: The basement lounge and game room, by Michele and Bill Collins, boasts newly exposed brick, a custom-made sink shaped like a cocktail glass and a mural depicting a classic image from a 500 Club flyer.

Patio: After the 500 Club burned down, the concrete slabs showing handprints of famous visitors were put into storage, and eventually placed here.

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