Hometta: Modern, Small House Plans from Internationally Acclaimed Architects on the Web

From Hometta’s press release: This sum­mer, mod­ern home-buyers will gain unprece­dented access to design qual­ity with the debut of Hometta, a mod­ern home plan com­pany offer­ing mod­est, green home designs from inter­na­tion­ally rec­og­nized archi­tec­ture stu­dios. Entirely Web-based, Hometta is on a mis­sion to make great design acces­si­ble and afford­able to a large cross-section of prospec­tive home­own­ers. Along with home plans, Hometta will offer a com­plete array of edu­ca­tional resources to empower sub­scribers through­out the home-building process.

Hometta is an inter­na­tional col­lec­tive of design­ers, archi­tects, builders, writ­ers and edi­tors who have banded together to improve the way res­i­den­tial archi­tec­ture is designed and deliv­ered today. The com­pany was founded by Mark John­son, a Houston-based green home builder, and his fre­quent col­lab­o­ra­tor Andrew McFar­land, a Hous­ton mod­ern architect.

We think it’s a tragedy that 98 per­cent of Amer­i­can home-buyers can­not afford the ser­vices of an archi­tect” says John­son. “Our sin­gu­lar pur­pose is to improve the design qual­ity of sin­gle fam­ily houses being built today.

John­son and McFar­land enlisted four “core” archi­tects, all known for highly inno­v­a­tive work, to estab­lish the vision for Hometta’s devel­op­ment. The core archi­tects — James Evans, Dawn Fin­ley, Brett Zamore and Blair Sat­ter­field — in turn recruited the more than 20 tal­ented firms who will con­tribute designs at Hometta’s launch.

As some­one who believes that architecture’s respon­si­bil­ity to soci­ety begins with the dwelling, I am very happy to be asso­ci­ated with Hometta,” says Wes Jones, prin­ci­pal of Los Angeles-based Jones, Part­ners: Archi­tec­ture. “Hometta takes the mys­tery out of build­ing a new home. By com­bin­ing a trans­par­ent process with access to a large pool of tal­ented archi­tects, Hometta makes good mod­ern home design avail­able, with­out risk or com­pli­ca­tion, to folks who might never have con­sid­ered real archi­tec­ture to be an option.

An Uncom­pro­mis­ing Vision

Hometta’s plans adhere to a pre­scribed set of cri­te­ria, uniquely inter­preted by each studio:

• Mod­ern: The homes are stun­ningly mod­ern, offer­ing all the design, liv­abil­ity and inge­nu­ity of a cus­tom home.
• Small: Capped at 2,500 square feet, the homes are smaller than the national aver­age. Their size makes them more afford­able and effi­cient, cre­at­ing a new mar­ket between large, cus­tom houses and mass-produced tract homes. Smaller homes also sup­ple­ment and sup­port, rather than com­pete with, the archi­tects’ core businesses.
• Sus­tain­able: By virtue of their smaller size, the homes will use less energy and pro­duce less waste. They will employ sus­tain­able design meth­ods and mate­ri­als, includ­ing hydronic heat­ing and cool­ing, pas­sive ven­ti­la­tion, and planted or solar-paneled “sides,” that boost effi­ciency and energy per­for­mance with­out adding exces­sive cost.

Web-based Tools

Vis­i­tors to Hometta​.com will be able to view all home plan design ren­der­ings, as well as orig­i­nal edi­to­r­ial con­tent: pro­fes­sion­ally pro­duced audio slideshow and video pod­casts, edu­ca­tional arti­cles, and a blog with exclu­sive con­tent from Hometta con­tribut­ing archi­tects. Web-based tools will be acces­si­ble by sub­scrip­tion. The Design Sub­scrip­tion ($9.95 per year) gives access to the inter­ac­tive, pro­fes­sion­ally edited Con­struc­tion Guide, with its detailed resources and advice on the entire home-building process. The Build Sub­scrip­tion ($99.95/year or $19.95/month) allows users to review all the builder plan sets and receive guest logins for their selected builder(s). The actual plans range in cost from $1195 for a studio-sized house to $3195 for a three-bedroom.

Archi­tects Con­tribut­ing Plans

The fol­low­ing firms are part­ner stu­dios that will con­tribute home plans for Hometta’s launch: Barry Price Archi­tec­ture Wood­stock, NY Bor­den Part­ner­ship Los Ange­les Brett Zamore Design Hous­ton Col­lab­o­ra­tive Design­works Hous­ton david­clovers Hong Kong Dufner Heighes New York, NY FAR frohn&rojas Los Ange­les / Cologne, Ger­many / San­ti­ago, Chile Garo­falo Archi­tects Chicago Guthrie+Buresh Archi­tects Ann Arbor, MI HouMinn Prac­tice Hous­ton, TX / Min­neapo­lis, MN Inter­loop — Archi­tec­ture Hous­ton, TX Jones, Part­ners: Archi­tec­ture Los Ange­les, CA Karl Wal­lick Cincin­nati, OH Keith Krumwiede New York / Los Ange­les Kiel Moe Boston KRDB Austin, TX MANIFOLD.ArchitectureStudio Brook­lyn, NY / Mainze, Ger­many Mike Jacobs Archi­tec­ture Brook­lyn, NY / Los Ange­les Min | Day San Fran­cisco / Omaha, NE over,under inc. Boston Project_ Brook­lyn, NY Roger Sher­man Archi­tec­ture Santa Mon­ica, CA Stu­dio Ter­peluk San Fran­cisco WEATHERS Chicago Zoka Zola Chicago

For more info about Hometta visit their blog.