The architects exposed its roof structure for more height throughout and dug out the street-facing end of the plan to layer private areas.
Houses We Love: Every day we feature a remarkable space submitted by our community of architects, designers, builders, and homeowners. Have one to share? Post it here.
From the Architect: "The existing single-story house could not accommodate the new residents’ needs; it would be necessary to add another story, but we did not want to alter the building’s original proportions. To achieve this, two steps were taken: removing the ceiling revealed the beautiful wooden trusses of the roof, and since the house was originally about five feet higher than street level, we were able to excavate about three feet in the area of the bedrooms. These two increases in ceiling height allowed us to rethink the spatial perception of the house, which had been strictly single-story, and to incorporate social spaces (with higher ceilings) and intimate spaces (focused on privacy and comfort).
"We built a mezzanine level relative to the living room, housing the children’s bedrooms and the TV room below, and the primary suite and office above. This design placed the focal point of the lot and the building in the open space between the living room and the outbuilding. The social area opens onto the backyard and integrates with the new outbuilding, which was constructed to house a barbecue area, bathroom, and laundry room on the ground floor, and a sun deck and sauna on the first floor. We removed the stucco from the two longitudinal walls of the original house, which were retained, revealing the solid brick, and reused the bricks from the demolished walls to construct the hollow-block elements and walls of the new outbuilding."
Municipalities across the country are introducing off-the-shelf designs meant to streamline building a backyard home. Here’s how to do it where you live.
Accessory dwelling units, or ADUs, seem to be popping up everywhere—and that’s because, increasingly, they are.
After Portland, Oregon, suspended expensive development fees for ADUs in 2010—building on earlier reforms that made them easier to add—the city saw a boom in ADU construction. Ever since, cities across the U.S. have been introducing similar legislation meant to make it easier for property owners to add units to their backyards.
While cities see it as part of a multipronged strategy to increase housing stock, the appeal is wide for homeowners. Some are building them for a family member to live nearby. Others are creating rentals to help cover their mortgage. Yet another set is building ADUs as their starter home, utilizing empty space behind their parents’ house. But lowering barriers to entry hasn’t altogether made building an ADU a breeze. Custom plans, engineering fees, financing hurdles, and endless permitting processes can often make them more expensive and time consuming to construct than you might think.
To address these pain points, several cities have created preapproved ADU plan programs. Often created in partnership with licensed architects and designers, the plans have already undergone an initial level of review, helping reduce costs, shorten approval timelines, and simplify the process from start to finish. In Tucson, for example, eligible projects using a preapproved plan can move through permitting in as little as 15 days.
Below, we’ve rounded up cities across America leading the way with preapproved ADU plans that, at least in theory, reduce the headaches—and costs—of adding a unit to your property.
Anchorage, Alaska
Photo by Jacob Boomsma via Getty Images
The housing issue
In 2025, Anchorage’s mayor’s office projected that the city needs to build or rehab at least 1,000 units annually over the next decade to catch up with demand. The housing bottleneck has some familiar causes: local rules make building difficult and expensive, while permitting and process delays stall projects before they get started. Construction costs are so high that many projects, especially multifamily rentals, are just too expensive to justify. In 2021, a typical downtown multifamily unit in Anchorage cost about $120,000 more to develop than its market value. Statewide, high labor, materials, freight, and supply-chain costs compound Alaska’s aging, often energy-inefficient housing stock. In Anchorage specifically, more than half of the city’s homes were built in the 1970s and ’80s, a legacy that’s expensive to heat and maintain.
In Anchorage’s 2023 Housing Action Plan, ADUs are one answer to the city’s infill problem. The plan calls for creating and expanding preapproved building plans, starting with ADU designs, while also making it easier to convert properties into residential use, subdivide them into multiple units, and repurpose vacant and abandoned properties. The goal here isn’t just more houses, but more kinds of housing: smaller, more flexible options for a wider range of people, and more ways to turn old, underused, or run-down buildings back into livable space without starting from scratch.
The preapproved program
Building on the housing plan, Anchorage launched a preapproved ADU program with two designs in spring 2026. The designs are free and have already been approved through the municipality’s permitting process. Homeowners can choose between a small 460-square-foot detached ADU and an ADU over a garage. The city says it plans to add more designs in the future.
The city allows attached, detached, and internal ADUs in all residential and commercial zones in the Anchorage Bowl, as long as there is another dwelling on the property. But the current catalog of preapproved plans is limited to two detached designs. If a lot doesn’t have room for one of those designs, an attached or internal ADU may still be possible, but it would have to go through the regular permitting process rather than the specific preapproved-plan pathway.
Key rules to know*
ADUs can be up to 40 percent of the primary structure or 900 square feet, whichever is larger, with a maximum of 1,200 square feet.
Detached ADUs are capped at 25 feet high, or 30 feet if built over a garage.
ADUs generally follow the same setback rules as the main structure, with some flexibility for side or rear setbacks along an alley.
Owner occupancy is not required.
*Chugiak-Eagle River and Girdwood have their own ADU rules, so homeowners outside the Anchorage Bowl should check the requirements for their area before assuming the same plan will work.
How to get started
After selecting a design, homeowners can request a "not for construction" plan set for early plot planning and cost estimates.
Before applying, schedule a free zoning review with the city and check in with Anchorage Water and Wastewater Utility; in rare cases, old water lines may need upgrades. Depending on the property, additional reviews may be needed for utilities, steep slopes, floodplains, wells, or septic systems.
To apply, submit the application packet including your building permit application, hold harmless agreement, plot plan from an Alaska Registered Land Surveyor, and any extra items flagged during zoning review. The department’s permit checklist breaks down the full process, cost estimates, and timelines.
Once the permit is approved, the full plan set is issued and construction can begin.
Los Angeles
Photo by Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
The city’s current state-required housing plan, which began in 2021, calls for more than 450,000 new homes by 2029, 40 percent of which should serve low-income households. But Los Angeles is already off the mark as it runs up against familiar market constraints, including high construction costs and labor shortages, as well bureaucratic barriers such as slow approvals, fees, and uncertain review processes.
But one bright spot may be in the construction of ADUs. In 2025 the city permitted more than 7,000 units, which beats out the housing plan’s target of 5,123 annually. And now, Los Angeles is proposing updates to its 2019 ADU ordinance that would bring the city’s rules in line with California law, which allows ADUs to be sold separately as condominiums, and includes other exemptions that could spur the construction of additional units.
The preapproved program
In 2021, the Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety (LADBS) launched a preapproved ADU plan program to make units easier and faster to permit. The catalog lists city-approved standard plans, including 20 currently available for purchase and YOU-ADU, a free, city-owned one-bedroom design.
The standard plans are designed by private licensed architects and engineers and have already gone through LADBS review for compliance with the city’s codes, though "preapproved" does not mean "permit-free." Once a homeowner selects a plan, LADBS still reviews how it fits the specific property, including zoning compliance and foundation requirements.
Key rules to know
Only one ADU is generally permitted per lot, and the lot must have a proposed or existing dwelling.
Detached ADUs can be up to 1,200 square feet, though other zoning rules—like lot coverage and floor-area limits—may still affect what fits on a specific lot. Local limits cannot prevent at least an 800-square-foot ADU that meets the required height and setback standards.
New detached ADUs generally need side and rear setbacks of no more than four feet.
Detached ADUs generally cannot sit between the main house and the street facing the front yard.
Structures containing detached ADUs cannot be more than two stories.
One parking space is required unless the ADU qualifies for an exemption.
For lots that are both in a Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone and a Hillside Area, ADUs are generally not allowed unless the lot is in one of the city’s exempted planning districts or meet added safety rules like sprinklers, one off-street parking space, and access from a street wide enough for emergency vehicles.
How to get started
First look up your property on Los Angeles’s zoning search portal to locate the lot and gather basic information, including zoning, parcel number, legal description, and lot area. Because preapproved plans still have to clear site-specific review, this is also the time to flag any property conditions that could affect what can be built.
Then browse the approved standard plans and choose one that fits your needs, budget, and site. YOU-ADU can be used for free; other plans are purchased directly from a designer.
Even with a standard plan you still have to submit site-specific materials: project information and area calculations, a plot plan showing where the ADU sits on the lot, and a complete copy of the approved standard plan drawings. See the building permit checklist for specifics on what the plot plan needs to show.
Filling an Airbnb with unique objects and quality furniture can feel like a big risk when it comes time to hand the keys over. A few owners of short-term properties share how they navigate that tension.
In 2019, Mitchell Bage and his partner Luis Santiago relocated from the Houston suburbs to Galveston Island off the Gulf Coast of Texas. As they renovated their 1800s Queen Anne Victorian home, the property’s separate guest cottage started to seem like an apt candidate for short-term rentals. Bage and Santiago, co-owners of staging and interior design studio Maison de Campagne, were no strangers to crafting elevated short-term stays nor its inherent stresses when they got keys to the aged property—Mitchell had already designed many.
Sooner or later, every short-term rental owner discovers that filling your rental with adventurous decor comes at a cost—pieces can be broken, stained, or otherwise rendered unusable overnight. Nobody wants to compromise aesthetics and fall victim to stereotypical Airbnb designs, but it’s clear how that typology emerged in the first place. Standing out in the market with high design or a distinctive point of view often requires putting objets d’art at risk, but this tension is just another occupational hazard. "Not every guest considers or knows an item to be bespoke or high value, therefore it must be a calculated risk the property owner is willing to take on," Bage says. "A good rule of thumb is that if it makes you uneasy just thinking about hands touching it, it shouldn’t be utilized."
With enough ingenuity, however, this tension can also inspire a wealth of novel interior design solutions—not just headaches. To get started, think like a hotelier. "A property owner needs to approach the hospitality sector with a business mindset," Bage adds. "It allowed us to fully understand the hospitality industry, which allowed our company great insight into what works and doesn’t work for heavy guest use and satisfaction."
Hospitality-grade furnishings were chosen for one of Maison de Campagne’s properties in Galveston, Texas.
Photo courtesy Mitchell Bage and Luis Santiago
Choose your furnishings wisely
Comfort satisfies guests like longevity satisfies owners. Mitchell ensures both by designating hospitality-grade furnishings for the most heavily used areas of the home. Higher quality means higher prices, but when it comes to armchairs, sofas, dining tables, and beds, cheaper imitations won’t cut it. "While these may be gorgeous products, their wear from guests may leave them prematurely damaged," Bage says. No matter how fancy a sofa looks, a posh facade always falls away if it’s cheaply made. Better to fork over extra cash the first time around if aesthetics are a priority for you.
Avoiding overly bougie accoutrements altogether could be a strong suit, too. While recently transforming a modern white box on Long Island’s North Fork into a cozy retreat by the sea, Hines Collective’s design of the rental property dovetailed practicality and authenticity. "It's not a mansion on the waterfront and we did not want it to feel that way," says Hines Collective design director Kerry Offsey. "It was more fun to play around with how far we can push high design on a budget that’s super durable."
To evoke a sense of place, the Hines Collective team sourced home goods from local shops while select vintage finds were picked up at nearby estate sales to further imbue character. Wallpaper, custom seating, and reupholstered pillows layer in distinctive touches amid a harmony of high and low as well. "I was very adamant that not everything was going to come from Lulu and Georgia," she says. "There’s some Crate & Barrel in there."
Vintage details blend in alongside newer pieces, like a washable rug, at Hines Collective’s retreat by the sea in North Fork, Long Island.
Photo courtesy Hines Collective
Don’t forget your flooring
Hines Collective also opted for affordable washable area rugs to stave off wear underfoot. At Sweetheart Hideaway, the woodland St. Joseph, Michigan, retreat Margaret Bienert co-owns with her husband Corey, a basket of house slippers is at the ready for her guests to keep during and after their stay. Her keepsakes read like a cozy amenity to guests, but they also finagle more mileage from the vintage charm she’s curated by inspiring tidier behavior as well. "If people are all wearing their shoes in the house, we’re going to be replacing carpets a lot sooner," she says.
Bienert picked up thoughtful hospitality hacks like this from years on the road documenting quirky and unique sojourns with her husband as @APrettyCoolHotelTour on social media. When it came to sourcing quality design objects, Bienert picked up even more from these beloved hotels. "I would ask if they had anything they were getting rid of or if they were getting rid of old brochures or postcards just so I could start kind of building this mini museum of my own," she says. "Until I had a house, it wasn’t very easy to just say, ‘Oh, I’ll take that dining set or tub.’"
The dream of her very own heart-shaped bathtub was realized once renovations wrapped on Sweetheart Hideaway, which oozes kitschy flair inspired by their travels. "The passion came from these weird, quirky places that are somewhat of a headache to maintain," she says. "I knew it would go away if suddenly I was like, ‘Well, what’s the cheapest option?’"
The Sweetheart Hideaway in St. Joseph, Michigan, is all-in on kitsch, but towels from Quince keep things comfortable for guests and not too expensive for the Bienerts.
Working with obtuse angles, triangular rooms, a leaky roof, and a pool full of frogs, a couple revived the storied midcentury and made it pop with color.
When Lauren La Cascia and Bill Schoenmaker first saw their house in Westchester, New York, they didn’t know it already had a following. Built in 1968 by developer Marcel Robins and architect Harry Wenning, at the end of a row of more typical midcentury post-and-beams, the home is made up of four connected hexagons, complete with angled walls and wedge-shaped rooms.
Decades after it was built, the house made an appearance in the 2007 movie American Gangster—the couple have since watched the film, and they note that a car blew up in the driveway in one scene. When it listed in 2023, both Curbed and Zillow Gone Wild ran profiles—and when a friend liked the Zillow post, Lauren wrote back: "We just bought this house!"
Lauren La Cascia and Bill Schoenmaker, with their daughter, Lana.
Tory Williams
Bill is the CIO of a building materials company, Lauren has worked in fashion and retail for 15 years in customer insights and analytics, and both are New Yorkers who had been living in the city for 20-plus years. "We knew that if we were going to leave the city, we needed to do it for something spectacular," says Lauren.
Not only was the hexagon house large at 4,429 square feet, with extra bedrooms and a backyard pool—perfect since the couple are the "entertaining hub" for their families—but there was a plethora of closets (17 total). "We have closets that don’t even have anything in them," notes Lauren. "Coming from New York City, it’s an unbelievable contrast to how we were living before."
Of course, what made the home so stunning—its hexagonal form—also made things quite tricky when it came to furnishing and fixing it up. "It walks like a maze because there are no right angles," says Bill. The couple thought they would just do a cosmetic makeover, but they soon discovered the structure needed rehabilitation. Within weeks of moving in, a particularly rainy season brought 18 inches of water into the basement, a pond in the backyard, and a leaky roof.
Before: Entry
Before: The homeowners opted to keep the original ceilings and travertine floors in the entry.
Courtesy of Frank Designs and Petra Design Studio
After: Entry
Frank Designs and Petra Design Studio found a vintage Stilnovo Sputnik Chandelier on 1stDibs, and had it delivered from France. The hallway has a vinyl Keshi wallcovering from Designtex, with Schoolhouse sconces.
It was out with partitions and in with straight lines: for the pink kitchen, bathroom tile with yellow grout, terrazzo flooring, and bedroom furniture with seafoam-green trim.
Houses We Love: Every day we feature a remarkable space submitted by our community of architects, designers, builders, and homeowners. Have one to share? Post it here.
From the Architect: "Located in a vibrant Roman neighborhood between Pigneto and Torpignattara, Casa Tahiti is the latest residential renovation completed by the architecture studio Margine. The client, a young advertising professional, envisioned a welcoming home with a distinctly pop character: a space capable of reflecting a dynamic lifestyle and a strong desire to inhabit a positive environment—a retreat where he could disconnect from the intensity of work and the pressures of city life.
"The architects were confronted with a complex spatial challenge. The original layout of the apartment, located within a pre-1939 building and heavily altered by a series of renovations carried out during the 1970s, appeared narrow, fragmented, and labyrinthine. Outdated wallpapers and successive additions further obstructed circulation and natural light. Margine’s response was a radical spatial transformation. By removing almost all of the internal partitions, the architects liberated the floor plan and created a generous open space where the living room and kitchen communicate seamlessly.
"Acting as a visual thread throughout the project is the white terrazzo flooring, a refined material choice that pays homage to Rome’s building tradition while enhancing the perception of space and light. Against this luminous backdrop, the project’s chromatic interventions emerge with striking clarity. The kitchen becomes the first focal point of the living area: a full-height pink volume topped by an open shelving structure with colorful profiles. It is balanced by a white island, a natural wood dining table, and a warm ochre yellow sofa that anchors the lounge area. On the opposite side of the room, a custom-designed bookcase echoes the grid pattern and geometric clarity of the kitchen composition. This play of visual correspondences, reinforced by pink profiles that frame the main living room wall creates a coherent dialogue that unifies the entire open-plan space. The private quarters are divided into two distinct areas, where color moves beyond decoration to become a defining architectural element.
"One of the most distinctive features of the project is the treatment of the bathrooms. Both are clad in small ceramic tiles punctuated by contrasting colored grout, transforming surfaces into graphic geometric compositions. The primary bathroom, entirely conceived in yellow, becomes a luminous monochromatic box. The shower area, integrated washbasin, and surrounding surfaces are immersed in a vibrant chromatic experience that envelops the space. On the opposite side of the apartment, the area dedicated to the client’s daughter was conceived as a small blue annex. Here, powder blue geometric details define both the custom desk and a cozy sleeping alcove, optimizing the available volume with tailored precision. This independent section is completed by a second bathroom dominated by deep green tones, where ceramic tiles, colored grout, and coordinated details continue the project’s geometric language."
Crafted from wood, stone, and glass, Aaron G. Green’s Anderson Residence is perched high on a Rancho Palos Verdes hillside with views of the Pacific Ocean.
Location: 8 Sea Cove Drive, Rancho Palos Verdes, California
From the Listing: "One of Frank Lloyd Wright’s most talented and original disciples, Aaron G. Green ran his own distinguished practice while serving as Wright’s West Coast representative from 1951 until the elder architect died in 1959. The Anderson Residence is one of Green’s finest works—an important and almost entirely intact example of organic modernism. While deeply influenced by Wright’s work and teachings, Green exhibited his own masterful and expressive architectural vocabulary in the Anderson Residence. The procession of space begins with a deeply recessed entryway. Once inside, a V-shaped plan directs sharply gabled rooflines outward in two directions; they seem to float above the living space. A private bedroom wing is to the left, and the more public spaces—living room, dining room, and kitchen—are straight ahead. In the primary bedroom, a wall of windows frames head-on ocean views. At the opposite end of the home, the kitchen is disguised as fine furniture, blending seamlessly with myriad built-ins throughout. From a central dining area, steps follow the contour of the land down to a sunken living room with original built-in seating and architect-designed furniture. Architect Eric Lloyd Wright oversaw a 2003 primary bath expansion, swimming pool update, and spa tub addition with reverence to the harmonious design of the home and its surrounding terraces, planters, and gardens."
The oceanfront property in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, overlooks Abalone Cove and Catalina Island.
It traces a grandiose extension down a hillside, made all the more dramatic by a climbing net that reaches the ceiling.
Houses We Love: Every day we feature a remarkable space submitted by our community of architects, designers, builders, and homeowners. Have one to share? Post it here.
From the Architect: "Set within the steep, wooded terrain of the Niagara Escarpment in Belfountain, Ontario, Belfountain House unfolds as a continuous architectural promenade shaped by topography, movement, and family life.
"Located on 3.21 acres of densely forested escarpment, the project transforms a 1970s chalet into a 4,628-square-foot, four-level residence for a philosopher, an artist, their children, and a dog. The design preserves the northern portion of the existing structure while extending the southern half along the original footprint, minimizing disturbance to the site and maintaining a close relationship with the landscape. Rather than relying on expansion, the project is shaped through subtraction, reorganization, and sectional clarity. The steep terrain, mature tree canopy, and desire for openness presented both spatial and structural challenges, requiring the architecture to respond carefully to the changing conditions of the slope.
"A single elongated roof stretches across the hillside, gathering the life of the house beneath one continuous span. Conceived as a sectional response to the terrain, the architecture organizes space through shifts in level, compression, and light rather than rigid enclosure, creating a fluid interior landscape attuned to the rhythms of daily life.
"Movement through the house recalls the cadence of hiking through the surrounding forest—sequential, episodic, and constantly shifting in atmosphere. The approach is gradual: visitors pass the artist’s studio and pool before the house quietly emerges within the trees. Entry occurs through a compressed timber-lined mudroom that gives way to a soaring living room anchored by a fireplace. Exposed rafters extend outward toward the canopy, intersected by diagonal red steel beams that stabilize the span while introducing a bold visual counterpoint. Suspended above the main living space, a large net functions simultaneously as barrier, hammock, and inhabitable surface for play, gathering, and rest.
"A continuous plane of wood and glazing reinforces the relationship between interior and landscape. Seasonal light, weather, and ambient sound become active elements within the home, while reclaimed elm, local stone, stucco, and radiant concrete floors ground the project materially within its setting. As the sequence descends into the slope, the architecture becomes increasingly embedded within the terrain. Contrasting stair elements—one carved into the hillside and the other suspended lightly above it—frame distinct encounters with the landscape. Lower levels contain spaces for recreation and retreat, including a sauna, gym, pool connection, and a concealed guest suite wrapped in angled polycarbonate that emits a soft lantern-like glow at night.
"Designed to support the evolving rhythms of family life, the house allows children to move freely between indoors and outdoors while maintaining visual connections across the site. Durable, tactile materials were selected to weather gracefully and absorb the marks of everyday life, allowing the house to be fully inhabited rather than merely preserved."
