Michael Maltzan Architecture worked with Holos Communities (formerly Clifford Beers Housing) to propose designs for three affordable housing projects on constrained infill sites in Los Angeles. All three projects share a typical modular unit design and stepped stacking strategy, which we developed with the input of Guerdon, a prominent modular manufacturer. By collaborating with Holos on three different sites, we were able to test how the stepped stacking strategy and standardized unit types could generate critically needed housing on a range of sites throughout Los Angeles, from dense infill sites to more suburban neighborhood lots. Each design provides light and views deep into the property, creates new physical and visual connections, and eliminates typical dominant street walls associated with 5-over-1 construction.

Santa Monica Housing was the first of the three projects, designed in April 2019. The massing stacks 49 units in a 6-story, 26,000-square-foot building that sits over a former Department of Transportation parking lot. The massing steps towards Santa Monica Boulevard, creating a shaded, green front yard while providing accessible stacked parking from the alley side. Open spaces and resident services are incorporated throughout the building. Solar PV panels are integrated into south-facing units, providing renewable energy and shading for the units.

MMA applied a similar approach in Echo Park, using the same modular units and stepping strategy to design an 88-unit, 49,000-square-foot building in September 2020. While Echo Park shares a similar form to Santa Monica, its relationship to the street is different given the site’s narrow 80’ street frontage, with the “short” façade serving as the public face of the building on Glendale Boulevard. Echo Park also introduced new unit types; in addition to studios, there are 1 and 2-bedroom units designed in the same modular unit proportions.

Working in the Wilmington neighborhood of Los Angeles in September 2020, MMA had an opportunity to investigate how the modular unit design and stacking approach could work in a lower density site, and with no podium, simply stacking on traditional footing, which creates a crawl space and accessible mechanical space. Like Echo Park, the 18,000-square-foot building’s short façade faces the street, with the 30 units arranged in a three-story massing that responds to the low-rise, predominantly residential area.

Taken together, the three projects demonstrate how a shared set of elements–modular units, open corridors, and integrated community and open spaces–can be arranged in a shifted stack to produce three different site-specific buildings. This strategy of using standardization and innovation to produce variation has potential to transform the speed of both design and construction processes, a goal that is essential given the scale and magnitude of housing needs in Los Angeles and cities like it.