Mr. Trump reveled in recalling the challenges required to design and build the apartment, decorated in 24-karat gold and marble in the Louis XIV style, saying he simply wanted to see if such an ambitious undertaking could be accomplished. He described it less as a home than a tribute to his own self-image.

“I really wanted to see if it could be done,” Mr. Trump said at the time, as he showed Mr. D’Antonio around the apartment. “This is a very complex unit. Building this unit, if you look at the columns and the carvings, this building, this unit was harder than building the building itself.”

Yet after meeting with President Obama on Thursday and touring the White House, Mr. Trump, according to two people briefed on his thinking, was taken with that building over all and marveled at the neoclassical architecture and history.

Returning home to Trump Tower from the White House may not be Mr. Trump’s only embrace of the familiar. His aides say he has also expressed interest in continuing to hold the large rallies that were a staple of his candidacy. He likes the instant gratification and adulation that the cheering crowds provide, and his aides are discussing how they might accommodate his demand.

“I think Trump has discovered that these rallies are tremendous opportunities for him to get his message out,” said Christopher Ruddy, chief executive of Newsmax Media, a conservative website. “It’s actually sort of old-fashioned, that you want to actually meet people and press the flesh with him.”

Not least, Mr. Trump is finding Twitter a familiar comfort, although it is unclear if he will be the first president to wholly control his own Twitter account once he is in the White House. “I know they’re willing to be unorthodox and want to be true to themselves and not fall into a habit of let’s just follow precedent on what’s been done,” said Mike DuHaime, an adviser to Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who supported Mr. Trump shortly after ending his own White House bid and who stepped back as the head of the president-elect’s transition team on Friday.