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Welcome to the weekend. I’m Carolina A. Miranda, arts and urban design columnist at the Los Angeles Times, and I am baaaaaaack. Thanks to my colleagues for holding down the newsletter fort while I spent two weeks in a pandemic resort of my own making, which consisted of generally not moving while reading novels, watching movies and dipping into the wide selection of liquor options that now come in adorable little cans. I’m The Juergen Teller internet hoo-ha My kid could do that. A version of that age-old debate cropped up on social media last week when W Magazine unveiled its annual â...

Before there is architecture, there is red tape. That’s certainly the case in Los Angeles, where the simple act of securing permits to build an average granny flat in an average backyard can turn into an epic back and forth with the city’s Department of Building and Safety over tweaks to drainage and electrical systems. A new initiative organized by Mayor Eric Garcetti’s office in collaboration with Building and Safety aims to change that — while inserting a bit of high design into a housing stock whose aesthetics generally lie somewhere on the continuum between box and shed. Imagin...