New housing options for San Diego students look more like luxury apartments than dorms—but the charms of the classic residence hall remain
“The biggest [mandate] was to make the apartments as much like boutique hotels as possible,” says Tamara Romeo. She’s the CEO of Southcoast Design Group, the firm behind Stateside and Monte, two new off-campus housing complexes near San Diego State University (SDSU). “Those spaces where people could gather outside of their apartments like they would in a hotel lounge or at a gym or at the spa—[developers] wanted us to create that same sort of vibe in the housing community.”
Indeed, students don’t have to venture far from their apartments to congregate in conference rooms and public study spaces that “look more like a coffee shop or cool café,” Romeo says. “And a roof deck is something both properties have. That amenity is really hot with students because they study there, they read, they gather with their friends, they work out.”
With additional perks like in-unit laundry, free coffee, and the ability to connect lighting, climate control, and other building features to devices like Alexa or Google Home, the student housing is near-indistinguishable from the amenity-stacked, high-rise, luxury apartment buildings that seem to be popping up all over the county—aside from the fact that each unit at Stateside and Monte comes furnished with familiar dorm furniture like extra-long twin beds.
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