Some companies are built around a product. Architectural Designs has always been built around people.

The customers who call before they've chosen a plan. The designers who have been sharing their work with us for decades. The team members who have spent years learning this industry so they can help someone navigate one of the biggest decisions of their life. Those relationships are what drive everything we do.

We've been helping customers find and purchase house plans for more than 40 years. Here's how that happened, and why it still matters.

The Davis family's roots in publishing go back to the 1920s. Long before anyone was browsing pre-drawn house plans online, Architectural Designs existed as a print magazine, helping homeowners and builders explore designs and find a style that felt right for them.

When the industry moved to digital, we moved with it. The magazine became a website. Printed pages became searchable plan detail pages with photography, floor plans, and detailed specs. A lot changed over those years. The purpose never did.

Today, AD is led by Jared Davis, the third generation of the Davis family to be part of this business. "There are very few businesses that make it from one generation to the next, let alone into the third generation," Jared has said. "It comes with a heightened sense of responsibility." That responsibility runs deeper than a family name — it extends to the designers who trust us with their work, the team that shows up every day, and the customers who are counting on us to help them get it right.

We work with independent designers and architects across the country, and many of those partnerships span decades. At a recent industry event, a designer mentioned to Jared that he remembered working with two generations of the Davis family before him. That kind of continuity is rare, and it means something.

Kitty Connor, AD's COO and a 14-year member of the team, puts it simply: "We're not holders of information here. We believe in disseminating it — and in the end, that makes us stronger as a company." That philosophy shapes how we work with our designers. With more than 25,000 house plans in our catalog — from modern farmhouse and craftsman to contemporary, transitional, and everything in between — the strength of that collection comes directly from the strength of those relationships.

When someone reaches out to AD with a question, they're talking to a real person who knows this industry and wants to help. That has always been important to us, and it still is.

Customers want to talk to someone when a decision carries this much weight. As Lindsay, one of our Customer Success Specialists, puts it: "We're not outsourced, we're not chatbots. At the end of the day, we are a family business filled with passionate people who are kind and dedicated and want to help customers." Our team takes calls, answers emails, responds to chats, and stays connected with customers across the full process — sometimes over the course of a year or more. They're not just answering questions. They're helping customers think through one of the biggest financial commitments of their lives.

Building a home is a big deal. We treat it that way.

The plan is the starting point, not the finish line. Buying a stock house plan is exciting, but it's also the beginning of a home building process that involves budgeting, contractor conversations, local permitting, and a long list of decisions that can feel overwhelming if you've never navigated it before. That's exactly why so much of what we focus on is demystifying the process and making sure no one has to figure it all out on their own.

Today we offer tools designed to help customers move forward with more clarity — Cost-to-Build reports, Materials Lists, modification support, and our exclusive partnership with Walk Your Plans, which lets customers experience a plan at full scale before they buy. Standing in a space at real scale changes how you see it. It helps customers feel ready.

One of the things we're most proud of is the community that has formed around AD over the years. Across Pinterest, Instagram, and our private Facebook group, customers in the planning and construction phase connect with others who have been there — sharing advice, progress photos, and encouragement through every stage of the build.

That community extends to our site as well. We have over 2,500 customer build photo albums — homeowners and builders who finished their builds and came back to show what they created.

"I stay in touch with a lot of people throughout their journey, and even with people who finished their builds years ago," says Madison, AD's Social Media Manager. "That support doesn't just disappear once the house is finished."

"We're still in the early innings," Jared has said about where AD stands today. There's a strong foundation built over four decades, and real momentum around what comes next — better tools, stronger designer partnerships, and continued investment in the services that help customers move from inspiration to action.

Patty Perschino, AD's VP of Finance and an eight-year member of the team, has watched that foundation take shape from the inside. "AD has always been about putting customers, designers, and employees first," she says. "That hasn't changed." And it's that consistency — through industry shifts, new technology, and three generations of leadership — that we keep coming back to.

The goal has always been the same. Show up for customers, support them through one of the biggest financial decisions of their lives, and never stop improving.

We're glad you're here.