Category: STUDIO CIRCULAR – Enough is Enough: Circularity and Non-Speculation as a Catalyst for Housing Innovation

Housing beyond Extraction explores how vacant buildings can be repurposed for affordable housing beyond speculative development. Informed by real policy precedents, such as São Paulo’s social function of property framework, the project treats vacant or underused property not simply as idle real estate, but as an urban resource that can be redirected toward social use. […]

The Last Metro Mile claims that publicly owned land and increased land values along Los Angeles’ Metro lines can be leveraged to deliver space and funds for a new wave of public housing. While public transit investments have significantly increased surrounding land values, resulting gains are commonly privatized. Simultaneously, the city owns a lot of […]

CEQA-Housing [CEQA-H] proposes a planning and design process for affordable housing that repositions architectural and procedural design at the center of environmental review. It proclaims that inserting affordable housing into existing urban contexts creates environmental and social benefits and counters potential local resistance through direct community participation, community stakeholdership, incremental transformation and implementation, and the […]

In anticipation of gentrification processes triggered by new metro lines, large-scale developments, and other urban displacement dynamics, this project proposes to use Community Land Trusts (CLTs) as a tactical tool of resistance. Deploying comprehensive, yet playful advocacy by using grassroots organizing, popular education, cultural engagement, as well as architectural and artistic expression., the goal is […]

Many cities in the U.S. face a structural imbalance in public resource allocation: stadiums and mega-event venues receive substantial public investment and incentives, while affordable housing remains underfunded and constrained. PLAY BALL! addresses this disparity by repurposing abandoned, underutilized sports infrastructure as long-term civic assets capable of supporting housing. Focusing on the Oakland Coliseum, the […]

Housing in the United States is viewed as a financial asset rather than a foundation for a stable life, leaving many residents cost-burdened, displaced, and disconnected from their communities. This project explores an alternative: co-operative housing as a way to build stability together. My work is grounded in ongoing participation at the Los Angeles Eco-Village […]

Los Angeles promotes ADUs as a solution to increase housing supply and thus counter the housing crisis. Yet many ADUs reinforce the speculative housing markets, rather than enabling affordability: High construction costs, complex permitting, and limited, financial resources prevent many homeowners from building ADUs in the first place, while those ADUs built are often used […]

American Indian and Alaska Native households face heightened housing insecurity across the United States. Respective HUD housing projects remain largely prescriptive, favoring standardized, cost-driven solutions that ignore cultural practices, environmental conditions, and Indigenous ways of life. These frameworks often impose rigid designs and ownership structures that undermine community governance and limit self-determination. Along the Nushagak […]

Los Angeles faces a growing housing challenge as seniors confront unaffordable rents, isolation, and car-dependent neighborhoods. Domestic Abundance reimagines aging in place through a distributed cooperative model that transforms single-family and multi-family homes into a network of shared care infrastructure. Aging homeowners can transfer their property to a community land trust, ensuring long-term affordable land […]