Design, Bitches
Looking to Build a Granny Flat in Your Backyard? Meet the Firms and Designs Pre-Approved in LA
Adding a backyard home in Los Angeles is now nearly as easy as buying a barbecue.
Homeowners who for years have wanted to build a granny flat in their backyard, but dreaded the red tape, can now choose from 20 pre-designed homes that the city has already approved for use.
The shift, made official last week, will speed up a weeks-long process and bring more badly needed units to an overpriced market. It also has the potential to elevate the 14 startups and firms building the next generation of homes.
The designs for the stand-alone residences range from a 200-square-foot studio to a 1,200-square foot, two-story, two-bedroom unit. And many of the homes are filled with design flourishes, reflecting the diverse architecture of the city, from a house in the silhouette of a flower to one with a spiral outdoor staircase leading to the roof.
It's no surprise. The program was spearheaded by Christopher Hawthorne, a former architecture critic at the Los Angeles Times and now the city's chief design officer.
The firms are primarily local and startup architecture and design firms, while others are well-known with a history of building granny flats, also know as accessory dwelling units, or ADUs.
The standard plans avoid the Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety's typical four-to six-week review process and can allow approvals to be completed in as quickly as one day.
Some aspects of the plans can be modified to fit a homeowner's preferences. Eight other designs are pending approval.
Mayor Eric Garcetti believes by adding more such units, the city can diversify its housing supply and tackle the housing crisis. Recent state legislation made it easier to build the small homes on the lot of single-family residences. Since then, ADUs have made up nearly a quarter of Los Angeles' newly permitted housing units.
Because construction costs are relatively low for the granny flats – the pre-approved homes start at $144,000 and can go beyond $300,000 – the housing is generally more affordable. The median home price in L.A. County in January was $690,000.
Here's a quick look at the designs approved so far:
Abodu
Abodu
Abodu, based in Redwood City in the Bay Area, exclusively designs backyard homes. In 2019, it worked with the city of San Jose on a program similar to the one Los Angeles is undertaking.
In October, it closed a seed funding round of $3.5 million led by Initialized Capital.
It has been approved for a one-story 340-square-foot studio, a one-story one-bedroom at 500 square feet, and a one-story, 610-square-foot two-bedroom.
The pricing for the studio is $189,900, while the one-bedroom costs $199,900 and the two-bedroom is $259,900.
Amunátegui Valdés Architects
Connect Homes
Design, Bitches
Escher GuneWardena Architecture
First Office
Fung + Blatt Architects
Fung + Blatt Architects is a Los Angeles-based firm founded in 1990.
The city has approved its 795-square-foot, one-story, one-bedroom unit with a roof deck. It estimates the construction cost to be $240,000 to $300,000, excluding landscape, site work and the solar array. Homeowners can also expect other additional costs.
Taalman Architecture/ IT House Inc.
LA Más
Jennifer Bonner/MALL
Massachusetts-based Jennifer Bonner/MALL designed a "Lean-to ADU" project, reinterpreting the stucco box and exaggerated false front, both Los Angeles architectural mainstays.
The design has been approved for a 525-square-foot one-story, one-bedroom unit with a 125-square-foot roof deck.
sekou cooke STUDIO
New York-based sekou cooke STUDIO is the sole Black-owned architectural firm on the project.
"The twisted forms of this ADU recalls the spin and scratch of a DJ's records" from the early 90s, the firm said.
Its design, still pending approval, is for a 1,200-square-foot, two bedroom and two bathroom can be adapted to a smaller one-bedroom unit or to include an additional half bath.
SO-IL
New York-based SO-IL was founded in 2008. It has completed projects in Leon, Seoul, Lisbon and Brooklyn.
Its one-story, one-bedroom 693-square-foot unit is pending approval. It is estimated the construction cost will be between $200,000 and $250,000.
WELCOME PROJECTS
Los Angeles-based Welcome Projects has worked on projects ranging from buildings, houses and interiors to handbags, games and toys.
Its ADU is nicknamed The Breadbox "for its curved topped walls and slight resemblance to that vintage counter accessory."
It has been approved for a one-story, one-bedroom 560-square-foot unit.
wHY Architecture
Firms that want to participate in the program can learn more here . Angelenos interested in building a standard ADU plan can learn more the approved projects here.
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Smaller Cities Are Attracting More Knowledge Workers
"Cities are in a fight for knowledge workers, they definitionally are. They want that tax base. They want that revenue base. They will try to appeal probably to younger, more mobile millennial, Gen Z workers and attract them directly and say, 'well once there's a core base in Salt Lake City, or in Wichita, or in Tampa well, that company will have to open an office there.'
It's more of a government to consumer marketing strategy than a government to corporation marketing strategy, and we're in the very early innings of that. And so, that literally would not have been possible. I think if two things hadn't happened, one, the forward progress of cloud-based collaboration tools didn't exist...And the second thing is (if) COVID hadn't happened because COVID was this unplanned forced test of the integrity of those tools and the integrity of a workforce that's working remote."
— Brendan Wallace, Fifth Wall
More Employees Will Work Hybrid
"The vast percentage of employees will be flexible.. And so they'll be close to a workplace. Maybe they'll work five days a week, maybe they'll work in the office one to two days a week, and go to the office to make plans to collaborate with their team to jam on the whiteboard.
"I think, at least you know 70 to 75% of all employees will be adopting the hybrid model."
— Justin Bedecarre, HelloOffice
At the Office, There's More Space
"We've seen the loss of 40% of real estate...because of the six-feet social distance.
"In some cases where we're talking about the knowledge-based tech workers, typically in San Francisco, you're seeing an average of 100 to 250 square foot per person. Now, after layering the social distance guidelines of the minimum six foot — which we don't even know today, if that is enough — you're needing at least 300 to 350 square feet more per person."
— Jen Nguyen
Copy of dot.LA Strategy Session: Office 2021, in Partnership with HelloOfficewww.youtube.com
Jen Nguyen, Founding Partner of TEAMWERC
Jen Nguyen, Founding Partner of TEAMWERC
Jen Nguyen is a founding partner of TEAMWERC, delivering best in class turnkey workplace as a service. She has a back to back track record building hyper growth inclusive award winning workplaces from the ground up. Founding workplace leader at Pinterest, Zynga, Tesla Motors and SAP Successfactors from their infancy through IPOs.
TEAMWERC will create a mindshift in how you approach your workplace bridging the gap between people and places, offering a plug and play expert team embedded into your organization.
Brendan Wallace, co-founder & managing partner at Fifth Wall
Brendan Wallace, Co-Founder & Managing Partner at Fifth Wall
Brendan Wallace is a co-founder and managing partner at Fifth Wall, where he guides the firm's strategic vision.
Prior to starting Fifth Wall, Brendan co-founded Identified, a workforce optimization data and analytics company that raised $33 million of venture funding and was acquired by Workday (NYSE: WKDY) in 2014. He also co-founded Cabify, the largest ridesharing service in Latin America, and has been an active investor, leading more than 60 angel investments including Bonobos, Dollar Shave Club, Lyft, SpaceX, Clutter, and Philz Coffee.
Brendan started his career at Goldman Sachs in the real estate, hospitality, and gaming group before joining The Blackstone Group's real estate private equity practice.
Brendan is from New York City and currently lives in Venice. He graduated from Princeton University, where he received his BA in political science and economics. He received his MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Justin Bedecarre, Co-Founder & CEO of HelloOffice
Justin is Co-Founder and CEO of HelloOffice. a modern commercial real estate brokerage on a mission to help everyone find a workplace they love. By empowering experienced brokers with innovative technology, HelloOffice turns the painful traditional process of searching for office space into a faster and more collaborative experience.
From headquarters to hybrid workplaces, HelloOffice works with companies like Palantir, Y Combinator, Afterpay, Brex and many others around the world.
Justin started HelloOffice in 2016 in San Francisco, and before that co-founded 42Floors which was acquired by Knotel.
Ben Bergman, Senior Reporter
Ben Bergman, Senior Reporter at dot.LA
Ben Bergman is the newsroom's senior reporter, covering venture capital. Previously he was a senior reporter/host at KPCC, a producer at Gimlet Media and NPR and produced two investigative documentaries for KCET. He has been a frequent on-air contributor to NPR and Marketplace and has written for The New York Times. Bergman was a 2017-2018 Knight-Bagehot Fellow in Economic and Business Journalism at Columbia Business School. He enjoys skiing, playing poker, and cheering on The Seattle Seahawks.
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