We recently shared the growing movement of ADUs, or Accessory Dwelling Units, to help combat the need for affordable housing in Los Angeles. But L.A. isn’t the only city looking to solve the problem. Seattle is facing its own housing crisis, and luckily designers are jumping in with attainable solutions, like the Stone Solar Studio. Designed by architecture firm Wittman Estes with prefab tech company NODE, the one-bedroom studio could be the answer, or at least one of the answers, to this global epidemic.

A Seattle homeowner hired Wittman Estes to design an affordable, eco-friendly unit to live in her backyard as a way to generate rental income. The modern structure is outfitted with a solar roof that provides all of the energy needed to power the unit and the main house. To make it happen, the firm partnered with NODE, known for their design-focused, carbon negative, non-toxic homes, resulting in Seattle’s first DADU (Detached Accessory Dwelling Unit) with the International Living Future Institute’s (IFLI) zero energy certification.
Innovative construction methods were used in order to bring down the building costs, making this prefab a more affordable option for anyone wanting to build one.
From NODE’s co-founder, Don Bunnell:
NODE is developing an assembly system for homes, increasing quality while reducing time and cost, delivering good design and deep sustainability with a guaranteed price and schedule ? something you just can?t do with conven...