After four decades of designing and building luxury homes across Southern California you might think Ardie Tavangarian had experienced it all. But it wasn’t until he completed his most recent project, Versa Villa — a 4,200-square-foot home in Pacific Palisades — that he had the feeling of wanting someone to try to burn one of his houses down.
That’s because Versa Villa was unlike any other project Tavangarian had embarked upon. After the Palisades Fire in which Tavangarian and his family lost multiple homes, the 63-year-old founder of West Los Angeles-based Arya Group set out to build the world’s first truly fire-resistant home.
He had two goals: build it fast (he wanted Versa Villa completed before the anniversary of the Jan. 7, 2025 fires) and secondly, take the idea of a fire-resistant home to its extreme.
Instead of a traditional wood frame, the 4-bedroom, 4.5-bath home incorporates 30 tons of precision structural steel which are central features of the home’s exterior panels. The 12-inch thick walls are a composite of magnesium oxide, sulfate boards, gypsum panels and stone while the windows are made from a special type of glass which can withstand extreme temperatures.
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The home comes equipped with two 20,000-gallon water tanks, an AI-powered detection system, outdoor sprinklers, backup power sources and fire-resistant aluminum shutters all of which can be controlled remotely.
The cost of construction for the home itself was around $3 million.
To be sure, Versa Villa may be more than the thousands of Palisadians who lost homes during the fire are willing to incorporate into their rebuilds. But it provides a fascinating blueprint and case study for a community now grappling not only with how to rebuild in an era of extreme climate catastrophes but also — and perhaps more importantly — how to get insured.
