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ADU’s offer an exciting opportunity for clients to add new programming or even additional housing to their lots! Whether that be an office, flex space, rental property, or in-law suite, we’d love to collaborate with you.
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CGA is well-versed in additions in Los Angeles, and have specific expertise in hillside regulations. If you’re interested in an addition, hillside or not, we’d love to help you navigate what’s allowed by code, and design an exciting new addition to your home.
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CGA has a honed approach to renovations. We often look to the building’s DNA for clues as to how to best design for it, while seamlessly incorporating the client’s desired updates. If you’re interested in a renovation project, we have extensive past work examples to give a sense of what we can offer you.
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Tenant improvements allow for a singularity of vision that custom residential seldom does. It's one of the reasons we enjoy working on design forward commercial projects! We have experience working within old buildings that had recent shell and core buildouts, spaces that need functional redesign, and projects that are an extension of their brand identity.
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CGA is a team of great designers, but first and foremost we’re architects and know how to build a building! Ground-up construction allows us to consider siting a building in the landscape and creating artful indoor/outdoor connections, in addition to the interior layout and finishes.
HOW WE WORK
CATHERINE GARRISON ARCHITECTURE
CGA is a design and client-focused architecture practice. We work primarily in the Northeast Area of Los Angeles but build outside the neighborhood and state as well. Practicing locally means we understand building constraints specific to the area, allowing us to design more efficiently and effectively.
CGA is very interested in the process of making architecture, and the gathering of talented people it takes to create the work. Our internal team has a varied breadth of experience, and we strive to form on-going collaborative partnerships with the contractors and tradespeople we work with. The Client is another key partner in the process for the design to accurately reflect their needs and the way they want to live and use it. At the completion of many projects, our clients are delighted at how well all their practical needs were seamlessly woven into the design.
We believe in making architecture that accommodates instead of dictates the way that people live. The idea of flexibility is not expressed in terms of neutrality or banality but rather using abstraction of form, light, and materiality. We challenge ourselves to incorporate as many programmatic requirements, materials, details and visual delight as the project allows while maintaining a sense of openness, naturalness and ease.
Site and Context are another important aspect to the design process – consisting of the immediate or distant landscape, urban environment, typology, or even the building itself. Such elements inform the organizing principles of the site that in turn establish the building’s relationship to the ground. This creates a strong substructure that must be present at the base of the design for the building to be livable and cohesive.
We often treat the building as the final partner in the design process. The building has something to say about what can naturally be done to it without losing its best qualities or what can reasonably be achieved within a specific budget. Most buildings in Los Angeles do not call for strict historical restoration. They were originally historical fantasies, and we try and capture that spirit and create a new chapter in their varied narratives.