Greg La Marco, owner of La Marco Homes in Birmingham, has traveled all over the world — from backpacking through Russia, China, Southeast Asia and South America (he met his wife, Stephanie, doing the same in Chile) to camping in the roof tent of a 4x4 truck in Southern Africa. He’s been charged by elephants, stranded overnight in lion-filled plains and been threatened with machetes on a remote Indonesian island. All the while, he immersed himself in local cultures — which included feeding his lifelong interest in architecture and construction.
“I’ve always been excited about different places and people,” La Marco says. “For me, part of that is seeing how things are built around the world.”
Born in Cleveland, and after college working in Chicago and New York, La Marco headed to London, where he earned an MBA from the London Business School. Working in investment banking for 10 years in the UK, he and Stephanie began their family of three children while the couple remodeled their apartment. Then a house. And also a cottage. His passion for architecture winnowed into a love affair with high-end residential construction.
Twelve years ago, business associates in the Birmingham area introduced La Marco to their construction contacts. “I was fortunate to partner with great people here, and I went all in,” he says. “We moved here and I put everything I could into building houses. I worked seven days a week, obsessed with understanding every part of building a house.
“To be honest, I found banking and the corporate world boring and a little soul-destroying,” La Marco says. “I was a square peg in a round hole. But I had this love of building. Moving my life away from something not satisfying and into construction was a dream come true.”
La Marco began partnering with great architects and designers to build what he calls “original and interesting but timeless homes. I’ve been very lucky to attract like-minded personalities — wonderful people who want stunning houses but are not ostentatious.”
In addition to passion and skill, La Marco brings a fresh look at how the traditional house-building process can work: His investment-banking background, running multi-million-dollar projects, accelerated his natural adroitness in finance and project management and critical reasoning, allowing him to give a concise budget and an organized execution. “If you have those two things, and have a system, you will have a happy build. Our focus is on building exceptional houses and an obsession with detail, from plans to finishes; our second focus is making the entire process, all the way to move-in, as enjoyable for clients as it is for us.”
When meeting with clients, La Marco first makes sure they are a good match. “I explain how we operate and make sure that meets their expectations, too,” he says. He then will partner with them through every step of the project — from finding a lot, attending meetings with vetted architects, interior designers, landscape architects and tradespeople, applying the same “matchmaking” skills throughout. “I assemble the team from people I would use in my own house,” he says.
La Marco’s company, including an onsite superintendent and an office project manager for each project, pores through the entire architectural process, creates detailed budgets, timelines and updates, attains permits, documents interior designs and selections, sits in on all meetings with the client and creates a streamlined, organized system. “’I'm the point person that clients can come to for everything,” he says.
THE HOME
“This is a stunning home,” La Marco says, and the owners of the Bloomfield Hills beauty agree. “I believed in the architect and the designer, and I really enjoyed seeing it come together. It’s got beautiful architecture, beautiful design, it was a great build with the client and they were super happy. It was just fun.”
The clients, La Marco says, wanted to build their dream home, “but they didn’t know exactly what that was,” he says. “I knew right away which architect would be a great fit — as soon as the client walked out, they said, ‘that’s who we want.’”
La Marco had found the family a lush pocket of land with plenty of room for the 6,000-square-foot home. “It has a stunning aesthetic, modern but with traditional aspects that make it inviting, livable and comfortable — my favorite kind of house.” Two distinct sides of the house are united with a flat bridge; a limestone exterior blends with Thermory siding, a thermally modified rot-proof wood.
In the back of the house, custom-fabricated steel frames a loggia, replete with fireplace crafted from stone and the same siding as the front. “I love the natural materials meeting the more industrial steel,” La Marco says. “And the interior has a sophisticated aesthetic that’s also relaxed and comfortable.
“At the end of the day, when you have the right team and right client, have a good system and love the stuff as much as we do, we can have a great experience and a flawless house,” he says.
“I’ve already had a career that I didn’t want. I’m doing this because I eagerly choose to. I think it’s awesome. I love architecture, but I like building these houses even more, and I’m very lucky to be able to.
“Building homes like this is really special, and it should be enjoyed — I try to make that a big part of the company,” La Marco says.
“I’ve had this cool work and personal background, and I’ve lived in different places. I’ve seen the other side,” he says. “But I absolutely love living in Michigan. I get to do what I love, it’s got a stunning natural world just a few hours away, where I love to sail. And Bloomfield Hills and Birmingham are very nice places to live. I’m here to stay."
“I’ve already had a career that I didn’t want. I’m doing this because I choose to. I love architecture, but I like building these houses even more, and I’m very lucky to be able to.” — Greg La Marco