How Ellery ADU Studio Huntington Beach Was Born in Huntington Beach
We remember the exact afternoon in late 2015 when we knew Huntington Beach needed something different. Nadia Ellery had been working with the parent studio up in Los Angeles, handling permit sets and field coordination for ADU projects that were starting to flood in after California’s law changed that January. A homeowner in Sunset Beach, someone Nadia had met through a mutual contact, called in tears. The contractor she’d hired had taken her deposit, poured a slab that violated setback rules by four feet, and disappeared. The city of Huntington Beach red-tagged the job. The homeowner was out sixty thousand dollars and had a concrete rectangle in her backyard that legally could never become a unit.
Nadia drove down that same evening. The slab was still wet enough to leave boot prints. The homeowner kept saying, “But he seemed so nice.” That’s what stuck with us. The ADU industry was exploding, and nice was the only credential most people had to go on. Nadia called the parent studio that night and asked to open the Huntington Beach branch. The promise was simple: every homeowner gets the permit set before the shovel hits the dirt, and every price is written down before anyone signs. We’ve worked under that promise here in Huntington Beach since that week in November 2015.
Nadia Ellery’s Personal Connection to the ADU Trade
Nadia didn’t stumble into construction. She was pulled in by the smell of fresh lumber and the sound of a nail gun echoing off stucco, the way a project transforms from lines on paper to walls you can touch. Growing up, she spent weekends in her father’s workshop in the San Fernando Valley, not learning anything formal, just handing him tools and watching him think through problems out loud. The way he’d hold a piece of trim up to the light, turn it slowly, and decide whether it was good enough. That slowness. That refusal to rush a decision that would be sealed behind drywall for thirty years.
The defining moment came in 2012, before ADUs were even on most people’s radar. Nadia was managing a small residential remodeling crew in Costa Mesa, and a client asked if they could legally convert her detached garage into a space for her mother, who was moving down from Oregon. Nadia spent three weeks in the Huntington Beach planning department, learning the code, drawing the plans herself, sitting on hard plastic chairs waiting for counter staff who weren’t sure how to process the request because almost nobody was asking yet. When the permit finally issued and the project finished, the client’s mother moved in and sent Nadia a loaf of sourdough every month for a year. That feeling, of building something that let a family stay close without surrendering their privacy, is what still gets Nadia out of bed. If she weren’t doing this, she’d probably be restoring old boats in Newport Harbor, working with her hands on something that has to function and last.
Over ten years in this trade now, and the feeling hasn’t dulled. Every permit set is still a puzzle. Every foundation pour still feels like a commitment. Nadia walks every Huntington Beach job site personally, at least twice, because the drawing and the dirt never match exactly, and the person who spotted the discrepancy is the person who sleeps better.
Meet Nadia Ellery - The Person Behind Every Job
Nadia Ellery is the Owner and Founder of Ellery ADU Studio Huntington Beach. She holds a California contractor’s license and has completed specialized training in ADU-specific code compliance, energy calculations, and the Title 24 requirements that trip up standard residential contractors. Before leading this branch, she spent three years with the parent studio in Los Angeles, working on the permit sets and field coordination that became the template for how Ellery operates today.
What separates Nadia from a corporate franchise technician is simple: she’s the one who answers your questions at the kitchen table, and she’s the one who walks the final inspection with you. She keeps a notebook of every job, handwritten, because she doesn’t trust her memory with the details that matter to your project. On weekends, you’ll find her at the Huntington Beach Farmers Market or out on the water near Bolsa Chica, where she says the quiet helps her think through the week’s coordination puzzles.
Her commitment to you is direct: Nadia Ellery personally reviews every permit set before it leaves this office, and she personally inspects every job before final walkthrough. Your ADU is her name on the line.
Our Promise to Huntington Beach Homeowners
Our values aren’t posters on a wall. They’re the rules we operate under, grounded in specific policies that protect you.
Honest pricing, locked in writing. We learned this the hard way in our first year in Huntington Beach, when a supplier raised steel prices mid-project and we had to absorb the cost ourselves because we’d given our word. Now Clause 1 of the Haven Standard requires every line item in writing before work starts. If we miss something, we eat it. Not you.
Quality parts, documented. Every material specification lives in your project file. We photograph what arrives, we photograph what gets installed, and you get both sets. In 2017, a homeowner in the Huntington Harbour area asked us to prove we’d used the specified insulation. We pulled the photos in under two minutes. That’s why we still do it.
Standing behind every job. Our workmanship warranty isn’t a piece of paper in a drawer. It’s a promise that if something we built fails because of how we built it, we fix it. No deductible, no argument about whose fault it was. In 2019, a window we installed in a garage conversion in Oak View developed a seal failure. We replaced it, re-flashed the opening, and repainted the interior trim. The homeowner didn’t pay a dollar. That’s the standard.
Our Credentials
- State-licensed contractor - every pro working under our name is required to hold the license and insurance California requires
- Insured and bonded - protection for your property and your investment throughout the build
- Years of local experience - serving Huntington Beach and surrounding communities since 2015
- Strong local reputation - built one project, one permit, one honest conversation at a time
These credentials matter because an ADU is not a small decision. It’s a year-long relationship and a six-figure investment in your property. You’re letting a team into your backyard, near your home, around your family. State licensing means someone has verified our technical competence. Insurance and bonding means if something goes seriously wrong, you’re not pursuing a personal bankruptcy for recovery. Our years here mean we know the Huntington Beach planning staff by name, we know which plans examiners prefer detail over summary, and we know the difference between what the code says and how this city actually enforces it. That knowledge protects your timeline and your budget.
Rooted in Huntington Beach
This branch lives where it works. Nadia’s team has crawled through crawlspaces in the Huntington Harbour islands, poured foundations on the inland side of Beach Boulevard, and navigated the design review requirements for properties near the Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve. We’ve sat in traffic on the 405 at 4:30 on a Friday, just like you, trying to make a 5:00 meeting with the city planner. We know the difference between a summer permit queue and a winter one, and we schedule accordingly. The Ellery name travels, but this office, these trucks, and this crew belong to Huntington Beach.
Written by Nadia Ellery, Owner at Ellery ADU Studio Huntington Beach, serving Huntington Beach and surrounding communities since 2015.