In a world of single-family zoning, we we’re pleasantly surprised to stumble across this recent article in the New York Times highlighting the history of a small New Jersey town and its success with “light-touch density” (LTD): small lot single-family homes, townhouses, triplexes, and fourplexes permitted on land zoned for single-family development. California has taken...Read More

Apartments, ADUs and Small Lots—oh my! As a response to the state’s push to meet current housing needs, new developments are popping up across Los Angeles at an increasing rate (Reminder: Los Angeles is currently short 456,643 housing units). Many residents would like to prevent new housing developments for a few fear-based reasons—loss of neighborhood...Read More

As Architects, we wear many hats—advocating for affordable housing, staying up to date with the latest design trends, etc. The list goes on and on. As much as we love writing long, educational blogs about housing in Los Angeles, we thought it was time to write something fun and easy. The best part about designing...Read More

Welcome back to our informal discussion about rising housing costs in Los Angeles. If you missed it, make sure you check out Part 1. If you’re back for Part 2, thank you for being here! I promise this one is shorter than the last. If you remember, we’ve been looking in depth at two critical...Read More

It’s a common question: Why is housing in Los Angeles so expensive? We are constantly asked this question by clients and decided to dig deep to see what drives the high housing costs across the city. The answer is complex, and sometimes polarizing, because there are multiple underlying factors. The goal of this article is...Read More

Our previous blog, The Great LA Delay: Why Residential Development is Taking Soooo Long, detailed how the convoluted permitting process is wreaking havoc with design and development in Los Angeles. In Part 2, we tell you about a possible “Secret Weapon” that could help smooth the permitting process, we’ve got some news on how this...Read More

#OperationPPE For many, the days have been long and are blurring together. Fortunately, our office has been able to operate our business as usual which has allowed us to participate in Operation PPE. If you have been following us on our instagram, you’ll see we’ve been 3D-printing pseudo N95 mask components for Keck Medicine of...Read More

3D PRINTING FOR ARCHITECTS Creating a 3-dimensional model of an architectural project is huge benefit to both the client and the architect. Gone are the days of cutting foam core into the wee hours of the night. These days, when we want to create a project model, we have access to the wonderful world of...Read More

  Whether you surf or not, we can all agree that surfing has this universal appeal of being “cool,” so you can imagine my curiosity when I first started my job at Tracy A. Stone Architect and saw a sign for Grain Surfboards on our building. “What’s up with the massive surfboard collection in an...Read More