North Shore, MA · Registered Architect · AIA · NCARB

Big ambitions.
Real constraints.
This is where I
do my best work.

Maybe it’s a house that hasn’t been touched since the 80s and doesn’t work for how you live now. Maybe it’s a historic property on the water with a complicated regulatory history. Either way, something’s already there, and that’s where I start.

Every project has its own rules: from the site, the house, the town, sometimes just how you live. I start by listening for those. Then I design, test, and refine until it fits.

By the time we're ready to build, I've already been inside the finished space. I know it works. My clients see the result. I know what it took to get there.

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Full Service Architecture

For homeowners with ambitious projects

You know this property has potential. You're not sure yet what it can actually become, what it will cost, or what stands in the way. That's where I start. I learn how you live, find what the building can do, and translate that into something you can see and react to. Then I navigate every constraint and approval to get it built. You stay in control of the decisions that matter. I handle everything else.

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Risk & Strategy Consulting

For developers who need expert eyes

I review drawings, identify coordination gaps, and flag risk before it costs you time or money. Pre-construction risk audits, third party plan reviews, feasibility & due diligence. I've been on the development side. I know how decisions get made, where projects drift, and what it costs when nobody catches it early. I'm the person who catches it early.

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Selected Work

Residential Addition · Completed

Riverview Addition

Tight suburban lot, historic 1790s home, phased construction while owners remained in residence, and support-of-excavation requirements not typically seen in residential projects. The owners stayed in residence throughout construction.

Historic Residential Addition · In Progress

Oceanfront Addition & Renovation

Registered 1800s Queen Anne on a sloping oceanfront site with a complex flood zone condition requiring persistent technical advocacy and strategic regulatory sequencing. Still in progress — this one is the long game.

Commercial Tenant Fit-Out · Completed

SugaringNYC Studio

First-time commercial buildout with demanding landlord coordination, permitting hurdles, and a client who needed to stay focused on her business while we handled everything else.

Residential Interior & Renovation · Completed

Westwood Renovation & Basement Fit-Out

Two-phase engagement: interior architecture for an ongoing renovation, then a return engagement to design and build out the basement with existing MEP coordination challenges.

"Design is not just aesthetic. It is strategy."

I started this practice for a specific kind of client and a specific kind of project. The property with real potential and real obstacles. The house that hasn't been touched in decades and doesn't work for how anyone lives now. Those are the projects I'm drawn to, and where I do my best work.

I don't have a signature style I'm trying to express. Every project has its own rules — the site, the house, the way you live. I design from those.

My career has taken me across every side of the table. As an architect at Gensler working on complex commercial projects, embedded in development and consultant teams on major Boston projects, and as an in-house architect for commercial and residential developers. That combination gave me something most architects don't have: a firsthand understanding of what's actually at stake when a project goes sideways.

I wanted to bring all of that to work that actually meant something to the people building it. That same instinct is what developers and investment groups hire me for, finding the problems before they cost money.

Get in touch

Let's talk about your project.

Schedule a free 15 minute call

info@sam-grace.com

617.766.5520

867 Boylston St, Suite 500
Boston, MA 02116

Big ambitions. Real constraints. This is where Ido my best work.