The Housing Shortage in Marfa, Texas, Gets Two New Pint-size Solutions

Architect Candid Rogers designs a set of rentals using durable, inexpensive materials inspired by the desert landscape.

May 10, 2022 - 07:51

The Housing Shortage in Marfa, Texas, Gets Two New Pint-size Solutions

Architect Candid Rogers designs a set of rentals using durable, inexpensive materials inspired by the desert landscape.

Although The Goat Heads are mostly clad in metal, it’s the plastic panel walls at the entries that really shine.

After accepting a 12-week internship at a bakery in Marfa, Texas, Hannah Delagi—who was living in Austin at the time with her dog, Bernie—scrambled to find a place to rent. "I was messaging Airbnbs and people would say, ‘I can’t host you the whole time’ or ‘No pets allowed.’ It was all no's," she says. A storied arts scene and fiery sunsets are drawing visitors en masse to the West Texas town, creating a lucrative short-term rental market for some and a shortage of housing for others.

As an experiment in creating much-needed long-term housing for Marfa, Texas, architect Candid Rogers developed a small empty lot with two compact rentals using durable, inexpensive materials inspired by the desert landscape. Rogers leases the 360-square-foot units, targeting a rate of around $1,000 per month. The Doors are from Jeld-Wen, while the wood structure is from Weyerhaeuser.
Photo by Jessica Lutz

Fortunately for Delagi, her search led her to Candid Rogers, a San Antonio–based architect interested in creating housing for permanent residents of Marfa. In 2015, he purchased two adjacent lots in the town’s West Heights neighborhood—one empty and one with an adobe casita that (naturally) he’d list on Airbnb when he wasn’t using it for creative respite. On visits over the years, Rogers noticed a growing need for long-term housing, so he developed the empty lot with two 360-square-foot homes (on paper, a principal dwelling and an accessory dwelling unit) that he now leases to community members like Delagi.

Renter Hannah Delagi and her neighbor, Hannah Lange, relax under the light diffused by plastic panels that front the units. — Renter Hannah Delagi and her neighbor, Hannah Lange, relax in front of the units. "I took a big pay cut to come here, and then I realized living costs were crazy. I’m so glad I met the owner. I don’t know what I would have done," Delagi says.
Photo by Jessica Lutz

"Even though it’s small, it’s super versatile," she says, mentioning how the living/kitchen area regularly becomes her yoga studio. Delagi’s place came furnished, so she pays more than her neighbor, name twin, and now pal, Hannah Lange, who moved from Houston with her dog, Cloudy, for an art gallery assistant position and met Rogers through a family friend. Lange’s monthly rent is $950, including utilities, about one-half to a third the cost of the other longer-term offerings found on Airbnb or Marfa List, if you can find one at all.