THIRSTY CITY: a new LA vernacular

For over a century, Los Angeles has been shaped by a design legacy built on the illusion of perfect weather and limitless expansion. But 20th-century architecture and infrastructure do not meet the challenges of 21st-century climate conditions, including drought, wildfires, and atmospheric rivers. In response, we propose a resilient infill housing strategy that directly addresses the dual pressures of land and water management, alongside the need for increased urban density.

Our design leverages the availability of city-owned lots to implement a replicable, distributed, and decentralized stormwater management system, establishing a network of fire-defense nodes across Los Angeles. In our prototype, the residential program is lifted above the landscape, freeing the ground plane to slow and capture stormwater, which is ultimately directed into underground cisterns that store ‘wet powder’ to mitigate fire risk during drought conditions.

By reimagining small-lot landscapes as a viable, connected fire-defense strategy, we aim to establish them as components of a city-wide on-call infrastructure. These sites can be both adaptable to unpredictable and evolving conditions and compatible with the city’s urgent efforts to increase housing density.”

Location: Los Angeles, California

Year: 2025

Client: City Lab UCLA, UCLA Architecture and Design

Service: Competiton

Award: Special Recognition

Credits: Amador Architecture + Design, Bradley Silling, Gideon Finck, Cecilia Huber, Soft Systems Studio

Hero Renderings: Shimihara