Multifamily Residential

In dense and diverse urban environments, homes come in all shapes and sizes. Like single-family homes, multifamily buildings are an essential component of the urban fabric, helping to build vibrant, healthy communities by creating housing solutions tailored to neighborhoods.

Whether designing new construction or renovating an existing property, our passion lies in working with clients who are committed to being good neighbors. More than the size of a development, we seek to collaborate with teams who value designing and building long-lasting and special projects.

From mid-rise residential or mixed-use apartment buildings to low-rise townhomes and residential complexes — new construction, refreshes, and office building conversions — we strive to make every neighborhood we work in more livable, more sustainable, and more able to support the health and wellness of the community.

Successful multifamily projects balance the requirements of the building as a whole with the needs of individual homes within, all while being an asset to the surrounding community. Buildings that delight lease up quickly.

Jurisdictional and code requirements for multifamily development play an outsized role on a project — while they limit what you can build, where, when, and how, we consider them an intriguing component of the puzzle. When you know the code inside and out, you know how to find creative solutions to the design challenge.

Making the numbers work is essential. Our team is skilled in analyzing square footages and proforma, and maximizing efficiencies, while achieving a unique aesthetic that is warm, friendly, and fits into the neighborhood. We constantly balance the numbers with the “look” to distinguish the property in the market.

We facilitate transparent communication and fluid project coordination, allowing our design team to quickly identify opportunities to create lasting results appreciated by owners, developers, residents, and the community.

Whether or not you already know the ropes (or red tape?), let us leverage our experience and connections on your behalf to efficiently guide your project through the permit and development process. Our team stays on top of changes in the evolving Pacific Northwest housing market so we always have a good grip on current trends and jurisdictional and code requirements.

The City of Seattle permitting process — especially for multifamily housing development — is comprehensive with many time-sensitive and interrelated moving parts. As appropriate for your project, we’ll shepherd it through everything from Early Design Guidance and meeting with the Design Review Board, to obtaining Master Use Permits, building permits, phased permits, early grading permits, and more.

With decades of collective experience in the Seattle market, we are deeply embedded in the nuances of the process. We speak the language. We ask all the right questions. We understand the timelines and the deliverables and their impact on the project schedule, and therefore the owner’s budget. We can help.

Our team’s deep and ever-evolving knowledge of how to guide multifamily projects through the entitlement, review, and permitting processes also extends to jurisdictions outside the Seattle area.

We regularly work on projects around the state of Washington — from Bellingham to Wenatchee to Spokane — and we have active projects in other states, as well. We know which questions to ask in a new area so we can get up to speed quickly and keep your project moving efficiently.

While Washington is our home turf, if you are considering a project further afield, don’t hesitate to ask. We maintain licenses in multiple states, and we can also partner with design firms in your project’s locale to provide collaborative services.

They say you don’t know what you don’t know, and surprises can seriously throw a project off track — and schedule, and budget. With fully integrated architecture, interior design, and landscape architecture practices under one roof, we see the whole picture. We know who needs to be at the table when and who needs to be a part of which conversation, so decisions are fully considered at the right time, not the eleventh hour.

The complexities of larger project teams with more moving parts and dependencies — not to mention more eyes on the bottom line — makes an interdisciplinary studio an especially valuable partner on multifamily projects. We avoid the cost implications and schedule impacts of late-breaking suggestions from an outside team. Our design approach is comprehensive and informed right from the start, eliminating the fits and starts of discrete teams taking their turn at the drawing board.

And interestingly, an unspoken synergy happens amongst the various disciplines, even when it wasn’t intended. We learn from each other almost by accident. Ideas float freely and new solutions materialize like magic. Best of all, with plenty of runway for great design at the start, we save time while delivering beautifully integrated projects.