Ori

As we delivered Ori Studios across the country, we discovered there's an interesting space between the traditional Furnished vs Unfurnished model dichotomy. Ori systems make an apartment feel bigger and also bring the core essential furniture items (bed, mattress..) that make move-in and move-out simpler. Then you let people personalize the rest of the space to their liking. It's not furnished, but it's not unfurnished either. We call it semi-furnished.

Front page of Propmodo today: another great story about how designing apartments "the Ori way" can make housing more attainable, while making buildings more profitable. Win-win for residents and developers. The Ori way = the smallest, most affordable, yet coolest (!) apartments in the market Read the full story here: https://lnkd.in/dDFVERVB

What if AFFORDABLE and DESIRABLE were not an oxymoron in housing? Building small makes it affordable. Building with Ori makes it desirable. Here a sub 300 square feet apartment with a bedroom, a living room, an office and a walk-in-closet. All at the touch of a button.

!! Exciting news in Mishawaka, IN !! We are thrilled to introduce The Avalon, our newest and one of our largest collaborations just outside of South Bend. The Avalon offers 76 Expandable and Semi-furnished studios designed to redefine modern living in a small footprint. These units are not only the coolest, most flexible, functional, & transformable units in the market, but they also happen to be the most affordable units in the building. Congrats go out to JP Wielgos III and his team at Seven Diamonds for believing in the power of space multiplication & expandable living, Giavanna Spalding and the Spalding Design Group for masterfully matching the interiors, & to Ken Lusian at Horizon DMB for bringing it all to life. It’s going to be a major success! Spalding Design Group, LLC Horizon Construction Group, Inc. Seven Diamonds Ori https://lnkd.in/ewxtaKDJ https://lnkd.in/edbPj7vF https://lnkd.in/eq-EFX3j https://lnkd.in/eSNY6idK

Some of my favorite Ori projects are in the most unexpected buildings/cities. If you hear "Ori in New York", most people will think about an efficient small apartment in the middle of Manhattan. But what about Buffalo, New York?! Campus West is a full Ori building in Buffalo delivered back in 2021, with both happy residents and a great ROI for the developer. Hear directly from resident Naquasia in the comments section.

Pretty magical to come out of the BART escalator in Oakland and see Ori apartments right in your face. And yes, I went up this escalator three times in order to capture this moment properly 😊 1900 Broadway is now pre-leasing!

WCVB Channel 5 visited our latest project in Boston, called The Smith (developed by our friends at BGO). Ivan Casadevante, one of the original co-founders of Ori and still our Head of "all things Product", shows us some of these new Ori studios for rent. Find more about these apartments in the comments section.

THIS UNIVERSITY PUT ITS STUDENTS IN 130 SQFT UNITS AND THEN DID THE RESEARCH TO EVALUATE THEIR WELLBEING. It turns out that young generations are very willing to exchange square footage for more affordability and better location, with no negative impacts to their wellbeing. Leaving the 130 sqft example aside (which is admittedly an extreme example): People will keep saying that housing affordability is a very complex matter and that it requires a lot of stakeholders and solutions to come together. And yes, there's truth to that. BUT, if we could come up with new space solutions to prove to people that they could comfortably live in half the size they live today, that's a pretty real solution to a very serious problem. Less square footage equals less rent, and yes, it's as simple as that. Fascinating paper by Jordi Honey-Rosés and team: "In our context, overall satisfaction with tiny living is high, even when absolute space is extraordinarily small, shattering conventional standards and minimum requirements by a considerable margin for most cities. Other factors appear to compensate for the small size, such as location, affordability, and privacy" Thanks Lily Reynolds, AICP for sending this paper my way. https://lnkd.in/dSjnZe3C

I have always admired IKEA and their vision to create a better everyday life for the many people. But as an engineer there's one thing I love more than IKEA, and that's all the creativity displayed by IKEA Hackers. This weekend I decided to attempt the ultimate "IKEA hack" and get my own Ori Cloud Bed ready for the Spring with a new look. What do you think? Hope my friends in Älmhult-Sweden approve 😊 🇸🇪

What if the answer to the affordable housing crisis was as "simple" as making apartments much smaller, but much better and cooler at the same time? Square footage drives cost, but not every square foot is born equal. Let's make every square foot count so that residents pay less for rent and developers make more revenue per square foot.