Architect-led · Portland-based · est. 2025
SorenWhitlock
Architect & Compact Home Specialist
Modern, right-sized house-plan reviews from a Portland desk. After eight years drawing homes — most of them smaller than the market said they should be — my work here is simple: help you understand how a compact, modern plan actually lives, before you build a square foot of it.
The Story
The first house I ever drew end-to-end was a 4,200-square-foot custom build in Bellevue, Washington. The clients were lovely. The lot was generous. The budget was deep. And about a year after they moved in, the wife told me — kindly, the way clients do — that they only really used about half of it. The formal dining room was a holding zone for boxes. The "guest suite" hosted three guests in eighteen months. The big bonus room above the garage had become a place where laundry baskets went to wait.
That conversation rewired the way I look at houses.
I had spent five years in school designing for area, prestige, and the lens of a glossy listing photo, and exactly zero learning the discipline of making a small house feel large. Square footage is the easiest design problem in the world. Right-sizing — drawing a 1,750-square-foot house that lives like a 2,800 — is real architecture. That is the work I wanted to do.
By 2021 I had pivoted my practice almost entirely to compact homes, ADUs, and modern under-2,200 sqft plans. The lessons came fast: circulation that does not waste a foot. Daylight from at least two sides of every primary room. A kitchen sized to the cook, not the catalog. Storage built into the bones, not bolted on after. Boring stuff. Quiet stuff. The stuff that lets a smaller home outperform a much larger one in the only metric that matters — how it feels at 7 a.m. on a Tuesday.
Around that time I started writing about it. First as plan-review notes for clients staring down the major online marketplaces, then as longer essays on compact layouts, modern minimalism done warmly, ADU strategy in a city like Portland, and what to actually look at when a stock plan claims to be "efficient." The audience came faster than I expected. Architects, builders, ADU homeowners, downsizers, first-time buyers doing their own homework.
In 2025 I co-founded Home Plans Ideas with interior & renovation designer Elliot Calloway to put it all in one place — I take the plans, Elliot takes the rooms. Honest plan reviews from the Architectural Designs marketplace, with a bias toward modern and compact. Room-by-room walkthroughs that go past the staging. Renovation studies framed around right-sizing, not just refresh. Long-form essays on why smaller, cleaner, more intentional homes age better than the alternatives. Written from a working architect's desk in Portland, for everyone who believes a great home does not have to be a big one.
The Four Pillars
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01
Right-Sized, Not Down-Sized
Compact is a design choice, not a compromise. A well-drawn 1,800 sqft plan outlives a poorly-drawn 3,500 sqft plan by years of comfort. I review every plan against that standard.
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02
Modern Without Cold
Clean lines, honest materials, generous daylight — but warmth in the wood, the textiles, the way a room receives you. Modern is not a glass box. Done right, it is the most welcoming style there is.
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03
Every Square Foot Earns It
No formal dining rooms used twice a year. No guest suites that house guests for a weekend a year and laundry the other fifty-one. If a room cannot defend its footprint, the plan needs to keep working.
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04
Plan Beats Style
Circulation, daylight, and program first. Finishes second. A great plan with mediocre finishes lives beautifully; a styled plan with bad bones never recovers, no matter the kitchen budget.
Areas of Expertise
Compact Plan Reviews
Architectural Designs marketplace plans under 2,200 sqft walked through room by room — circulation, daylight, structure, mechanical, and who each design is really for.
ADU & Small-Lot Design
Detached units, garage conversions, and infill cottages — drawn for cities where lot size and code shape every decision before you reach the floor plan.
Modern Floor Plan Analysis
Sight lines, ceiling moves, structural bays, and the small layout choices that let a clean modern plan feel calm instead of clinical.
Right-Sizing Renovations
Real before-and-after projects framed as right-sizing studies — what was removed, what was condensed, and what the home gained by getting smaller in the right places.
Built-Ins & Smart Storage
The single biggest reason small homes feel small is bad storage. I cover banquettes, wall systems, mudroom strategy, and millwork that earns back square footage you did not know you had.
Home Essays
Long reads on compact living, modern minimalism, and the quiet ways smaller homes shape a slower, more intentional life.
Where I Work
My desk is in Portland, but the projects I review and the homes I write about pull me up and down the West Coast and across the modern-compact corridor. Climate, lot constraints, ADU codes, and regional construction culture all reshape what a small plan should actually do — a Portland infill cottage does not draw like a Bend mountain modern, and a Seattle backyard ADU does not solve like a Boulder accessory unit.
Most of my references land within this radius:
Portland, OR·Seattle, WA·Bend, OR·Eugene, OR·Tacoma, WA·Bellingham, WA·Boise, ID·Boulder, CO·Bozeman, MT·Salt Lake City, UT
The Journey
First Sealed Drawings
First set of working drawings sealed under my own name — a 4,200 sqft custom build in Bellevue, WA. The project that later taught me what a house gains by being smaller.
Joining a Seattle Practice
Two years on the boards at a small Seattle firm — additions, ADUs, a handful of full new builds, and the first small-footprint projects that began to reshape how I thought about plans.
The Compact Pivot
Moved my practice to Portland and pivoted almost entirely to compact homes, ADUs, and modern under-2,200 sqft plans. The work I had been quietly drifting toward for years.
Started Writing
First long-form plan-review notes for clients shopping the major online marketplaces. The public audience showed up before I had a place to put it.
Home Plans Ideas Launches
Eight years on the boards, hundreds of compact plans walked through, and a clear way of looking at modern, right-sized homes — pulled into a single publication, co-founded with interior & renovation designer Elliot Calloway. Portland-based, architect-led, no fluff.
§ 06 — Connect
Find me where you scroll
Architect-led plan reviews, compact-home walkthroughs, and Portland-rooted modern design thinking — shared on the platforms you already use.