Selected Projects
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Studio for Teaching, Landscape & Architecture
Selected Projects
More Projects Coming Soon
Who We Are
STLA is a practice led by Steve Tucker, a multidisciplinary designer working across architecture, landscape architecture, and teaching.
Founded on the premise that design education and professional practice reinforce one another, STLA works across traditional boundaries to create beautiful spaces.
Full-service design
Feasibility studies
Permitting & code navigation
Design consultation
Project management
Higher education instruction
Client & community education
Regulatory & code guidance
Mentorship & apprenticeship
Continuing education
Residential landscape design
Site planning & grading
Planting & ecological design
Hardscape & outdoor living
Stormwater & drainage
Residential design
New construction
Renovations, remodels
Additions
Small commercial
Approach
Every project starts with a conversation. We want to understand what you're trying to achieve — not just the program, but how you live or work, what isn't serving you, and what matters enough to keep. From there we analyze the site, looking at its context, constraints, and opportunities. What's possible is always shaped by both.
In the early design phase we work through multiple options — different approaches to layout, organization, and form. We bring these to you as a conversation, not a presentation. Options rarely stay separate for long: a spatial idea from one scheme might sharpen another, and the strongest elements often migrate across concepts before a direction emerges. The final approach is built from that process, not chosen from a menu.
Once a direction is established, we develop it fully — working through the details of the design — spatial, material, and technical — in coordination. Design intent translates into documents that can actually be built: permit sets, construction drawings, specifications. We navigate approvals — local agencies, planning boards, engineering — as part of the project, not obstacles around it.
Construction administration is where we make sure the design gets built the way it was intended. We visit the site regularly, conduct inspections, respond to contractor questions, review materials and submittals, and address anything that comes up in the field. You have a point of contact throughout, and decisions get made with your interests in mind.
Writing
All posts →May 2026
The Sandy Fire. El Niño. A hotter fire season ahead. If your property sits inside a WUI zone, what you can build, what materials you can use, and whether your insurance carrier stays are all on the line. Here's what every California homeowner needs to know.
May 2026
California's ADU laws have changed more dramatically in the last five years than in the previous fifty. Here's what every Bay Area homeowner needs to know about what's now allowed on their lot — by right.
Get In Touch
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together.
Serving clients in the San Francisco Bay Area: Oakland, Berkeley, Albany, Alameda, El Cerrito, Richmond, San Leandro, Hayward, Fremont, San Jose, Orinda, Lafayette, Walnut Creek, Pacifica, Palo Alto, Menlo Park, Atherton, Burlingame, and Marin.
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