What does it take to build a very green infill condominium project in conservative, tourist-driven, image-conscious Santa Barbara, where detractors argue that solar panels on red-tile roofs create visual blight? “It takes explaining and patience,” says Dennis Thompson, AIA, the architect charged with shepherding a four-unit project through the seaside hamlet’s notoriously picky boards, commissions,…
So how did Richard Gomez manage to build an architect-designed home in Long Beach for less than $300,000, including the land? Here’s what made it possible: 1. Richard bought the lot in 2001 for $30,000. Why so cheap? The lot is tiny, at 45 feet by 50 feet, and it had some "issues" that had…
If you consider Southern California one big neighborhood, then the designers and architects listed below have been recommended by neighbors. And these neighbors were so pleased with their remodels that they wanted to see them, and their architect or designer, featured in the Los Angeles Times, in my "Pardon Our Dust" series. That’s a pretty…
This modern single-family home in Santa Monica was named one of the top 10 green projects by the American Institute of Architects. The house is two stories, 2,480 square feet, four bedrooms, three and a half bathrooms, and earned the LEED Platinum-level certification from the U.S. Green Building Council. The house was created by Living…
If you’re building a house or planning a good-sized remodel, you should read “House” by Tracy Kidder. It’s one of the top 10 books I’ve ever read. Kidder, who won a Pulitzer Prize for a previous book on the birth of personal computers, “Soul of a New Machine,” hangs out for a year with Apple…
Before its major remodel, this 1921 Granada Hills home had virtually no discernable exterior style. That’s because the original house had been distorted in the 1950s with a boxy family room addition that went clear across the front, enclosing the front door and forcing the inhabitants to enter thereafter through a side door. When owners…