The industry, as she experienced it, was built around scale, consumption, and excess—often disconnected from how people actually live.
“I really wanted to cater to those who didn’t have as much,” she says
Rethinking What a Home Should Be
When Lustado launched her firm in 2010, the vision was already clear, even if the market wasn’t. Her focus wasn’t on larger homes or high- end custom builds. It centered on creating spaces that were functional, efficient, and accessible. At the time, the dominant trend leaned in the opposite direction.
“McMansions were popular,” she recalls
Her response was to move smaller—not as a limitation, but as a design philosophy grounded in efficiency and long-term livability. That thinking deepened during a research fellowship in Germany, where she studied how housing systems could deliver quality without inflating cost.
The way they do it isn’t necessarily by using lower- grade materials, It’s by making the construction process more efficient.
69
— LUSTADO
VINA LUSTADO | OWNER
Made with FlippingBook Ebook Creator