The use of brick at archways and around a domed ceiling lends this foyer an Old World look, which is becoming popular.

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When Brad and Sandy Bauer designed a high-end model home last year in Oro Valley, they based the look on houses they'd seen in Italy and Austria. The interior of the Tuscan-look house showed off stone and brick detail in numerous ways: exposed brick archways and wine vault, a stone fire surround and a kitchen counter featuring a stone base.

This look is something they've been seeing in Phoenix homes for a few years, says Brad, owner of Bauer Homes Ltd. And according to Tucson interior designer Betsy Brittenham, it's taking off in Tucson, too, in both residential and commercial buildings.

"It's more of an awakening" rather than a trend, says Brittenham, who worked on the Bauer home. "Stone is very timeless and Old World and traditional. It can automatically create an Old World look if done correctly."

It's also traditionally been pricey. But the emergence of stone veneers (see related story) and, more recently, fake stone have brought this look to the masses.

The Bauers' model home was open to the public earlier this year as part of the Southern Arizona Home Builders Association's Parade of Homes. But only a very keen eye would notice that they used faux stone and brick throughout.

Their suppliers — Eldorado Stone and Coronado Stone Products, both California-based — cast from molds of real stone to produce veneers that weigh and cost much less. The Bauers say they chose faux brick because it opened up their choices of color finishes and — ironically — made it look aged enough to pass for the real Tuscan thing.

All of this doesn't wash with Gale Maly, however, a Foothills homeowner who favors authenticity. Her own trips to Tuscany inspired an impressive new addition to her 1970s house.

It involved enclosing part of her poolside patio and turning it into an extra living space with wooden beams, brick floor and exposed brick detail that give it a look of old Italy.

The work took five months last year, and included covering the concrete floor with travertine pavers and turning the former barbecue area — which already featured brick detail — into a second kitchen. Maly, who owns a construction company, had someone painstakingly distress the new bricks added in the kitchen, so that they fit in with the original ones.

Look-alike products would not have been an option for Maly, who admits to being a stickler for detail. She says of other such rustic looks she sees in Tucson: "Some of it is so un-Tuscan, it's not authentic. They're somebody's version of what they think Tuscan and Italy is like."

But whether they're going for real or faux, the people using stone and brick features are in agreement on their positive effects.

"It lends a real naturalness and depth to even the contemporary style," says Sandy Bauer.

Says Brad Bauer of the model home: "The comments we got the most when they walked in was that it looks very warm and very comfortable. They could just live here right now."

Maly says she believes the comfortable feel of using brick inside a house goes back to Americans' settler roots.

"There was a lot of brick on the East when people first came. All the homes you see in Boston are brick; courtyards have brick. It just conjures up a feeling of authenticity, warmth and also age," she says.