In the early 2000s, while a student at the Odesa Academy of Civil Engineering and Architecture, I descended into the basement of the Regional Library to study American homebuilding magazines. The library's most recent issues were from the 1950s, maybe the 60s.

Architects live with the unfortunate stigma around their tendency to make projects more expensive. While it may be true in many instances, a good Architect can help you reduce the overall cost of construction. The trick is to find a competent Architect and establish a trusting relationship with them.

Somehow, in the America of today, walking in our daily lives feels like a luxury. A luxury reserved for New Yorkers, and in general, people who can afford to live in bustling cities. How did such a basic human activity, so exciting to discover around 1 year of age, become the exclusive perk for the rich?

There are many incremental, subtle ways to gradually increase density in our neighborhoods, house more people, and keep development at a human scale. Here are three.

You may think, why should this be celebrated, isn’t it just part of the Architect’s job to help clients get permits? And yet, every time we get a building permit, we do a little happy dance.

We have created a feedback loop between our warming-up atmosphere and our living environment. We have become that frog that is being slowly cooked and doesn’t know it.

In a world where AI technology is gaining more and more popularity, many worry that this new phenomenon will eventually take over most jobs. If the world is changing to become more automated, how do AI technology and architects coexist? Or can they?

It's no secret that California, along with many other states, is grappling with a housing affordability crisis and a homelessness crisis. The situation is particularly noticeable in metropolitan areas like the Bay Area.

Do you know what an Architect thinks about on a rainy day? Well, it is probably the same thing a good contractor thinks about: did my building leak? A lot of famous architecture is infamous for just that: leaking.

Like interacting with a piece of art, experiencing architecture through a series of spaces, textures, volumes, and light variations brings on a response. This is why we feel differently in rooms with low ceilings (cozy, sheltered, or oppressed, anxious) than those with high ceilings and lots of light (inspired, free, or lost, overwhelmed).

Designing a tiny house is a challenge: reducing spaces to the maximum and optimizing them to fit everything you need is not an easy task. Every corner must be thought out and designed in detail, squeezing every square foot to get the most out of it.

In March of 2016, the British polar expedition vessel Sir David Attenborough came within a hair of being forever known as Boaty McBoatface.

Our hearts go out to families of casualties in Turkey-Syria earthquake. We design buildings in seismically active California every day and we would like to question our readiness for an earthquake.

Here is the summary of our findings for real-estate developers who are looking for opportunities, followed by a detailed description of each new apartment complex.

Architects shy away from the topic of increased construction costs when all the bells and whistles of net-zero buildings are called for. If built to the highest standard, such a building can cost twice as much as a conventional one.

Cirillo has no regrets and claims that all of his business activity in Russia has been legal. Maybe so. However, how does one reconcile the ethics of working for the world’s worst dictator?

In new home construction technology today, there are few things more exciting than the 3D-printing of entire homes. It sounds like something straight from a sci-fi movie: what, a giant printer oozing out some sort of material that then solidifies and, layer after layer, forms a house?

Should your water heater be all-electric, gas, or hybrid? Tank or tankless? Should your kitchen have under-cabinet lighting? What color should the grout be in your bathroom? A million decisions will be made during your construction project, and someone will have to make them. Who will it be?

On this occasion, I wear black - not as a grieving color, but as an invisibility cloak. I look at myself in the mirror: of course I am not invisible, quite the opposite, wearing black on a sunny California morning is a sharp contrast. I am very much visible, and I look great in black, just like all the other architects before me.