Atherton, California – October 24, 2026 – Saga Interiors, the interior design firm led by founder and principal designer Mahsa Afsharpour, has published an Atherton interior design guide for homeowners building new or renovating in the San Mateo County town. Written for homeowners researching the top luxury interior designers in Atherton, the guide covers the town’s housing, how its lot and tree rules shape a new home, Saga’s services and published minimums, featured Peninsula projects and answers to more than 20 common questions.
Atherton is built around large single-family homes. According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (2020 to 2024), about 97 percent of the town’s 2,667 housing units are single-family detached, and a January 2022 Town of Atherton staff report lists a standard minimum lot size of one acre. The housing stock spans eras: about 59 percent of homes were built before 1970, while close to 15 percent were built in 2010 or later. That mix means many Atherton projects are either a new house or a deep renovation of an older one, the two kinds of work the guide focuses on.
The guide also addresses trees, a real planning factor in the town. Atherton regulates heritage trees, requires protective fencing around trees on construction sites, asks for quarterly arborist reports during construction and requires landscape screening for new homes. Because those rules affect where a house sits and what its windows look out on, the guide recommends planning furniture layouts, glazing and outdoor rooms from the same site plan the architect and arborist are using.
Saga’s approach to new construction interior design starts at the architectural stage. “We prefer to be involved in your project as early as possible,” the firm’s services page states. Saga coordinates with the architect, builder and structural engineer, produces sketches, elevations and 3D renderings, designs custom kitchen and bath cabinetry, and tracks costs and lead times on specification sheets before handling procurement, site visits, installation and styling. The firm’s inquiry page states that renovation projects typically begin at $150,000 or more in overall scope, furnishing projects require a two-room minimum, and design fees begin at $10,000.
Saga serves Atherton from its Millbrae studio, and the guide’s featured projects come from nearby Peninsula towns and San Francisco. One is Casa Renacimiento, a 1931 Spanish Revival home in San Mateo that Saga refreshed for a young family on a tight timeline. The team removed excess wood battens from the vaulted ceiling, leaving one central beam and two cross beams in a warm mahogany stain, arched doorways, refinished the floors and rebuilt the kitchen from flooring to hood. Another is the 181 Fremont penthouse in San Francisco, which Afsharpour began while the unit was in its final stages of construction.
Afsharpour has also written about the shell of the house. In a post on the firm’s blog about lessons from California’s fires, she argued for rethinking the reliance on wood framing in high-risk areas and pointed to measures such as non-combustible clay tile or metal roofing, metal mesh over vents, tempered glass on exposed sides and early consultation with architects and fire mitigation experts. The guide presents those points as a conversation worth having before materials are set on a new Atherton build.
Saga Interiors holds a 5.0-star rating on Yelp. Laura C. of Palo Alto wrote, “I contacted seven other designers before her. By far, she was the most responsive, fast, cost efficient, and generous with her time and expertise.”
Before founding Saga in 2016, Afsharpour spent more than 15 years in corporate project management and leadership, according to the firm. Saga describes its style as warm modern, with Persian, Scandinavian and California influences. The firm’s 181 Fremont penthouse was featured in a MyDomaine home tour, Afsharpour has been quoted in The Spruce, and the firm has a profile in Architectural Digest’s AD PRO Directory. The Atherton guide joins the firm’s guides for Hillsborough and San Francisco homeowners, and inquiries can be made through the firm’s website.
About Saga Interiors
Saga Interiors is a boutique residential and commercial interior design firm based in Millbrae, California, founded in 2016 by principal designer Mahsa Afsharpour. The firm provides whole-home design and furnishing, luxury renovations and remodels, and new construction interior design across the San Francisco Bay Area. Its warm modern style draws on Persian, Scandinavian and California influences. The firm’s stated mission is to design homes that serve as a personal sanctuary and reflect the story of the people who live in them.
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