## Facts

- Dimiter and Joan Stoyanoff owned a lot in the City of Ladue, Missouri, and sought a permit to build a single-family residence of an unusual, ultramodern design.
- The construction plans complied with Ladue’s building and zoning requirements.
- Ladue ordinances required proposed building plans to be approved by an Architectural Board before the building commissioner could issue a permit.
- The ordinances stated an objective of preventing “unsightly, grotesque and unsuitable” structures that could harm surrounding property, stability of values, and the community’s general welfare.
- The Architectural Board, following notice and hearing procedures, refused to approve the plans because the design was not in conformity with surrounding structures.
- An expert submitted evidence that the proposed design would substantially and adversely affect neighborhood property values.
- Because of the Board’s disapproval, the building commissioner denied the permit.
- The owners sought a peremptory writ of mandamus compelling issuance of the permit, alleging the ordinances were unconstitutional for vagueness, unlawful delegation, and improper reliance on aesthetics.

## Issues

1. Whether the architectural review ordinances were authorized by the city’s delegated police power to regulate for the “general welfare,” including protection of property values.
2. Whether the ordinances were unconstitutionally vague for failing to provide sufficient standards to guide the Architectural Board’s decisions.
3. Whether delegating plan-approval authority to an Architectural Board constituted an unlawful delegation of legislative power.
4. Whether denial of the permit deprived the owners of property without due process or amounted to a taking where the plans otherwise satisfied zoning and building codes.

## Decision

- The Missouri Supreme Court reversed the summary judgment that had invalidated the ordinances and ordered issuance of the permit.
- The court upheld the ordinances as constitutional and a valid exercise of municipal police power.
- The court set aside the writ of mandamus and allowed the permit denial to stand based on the ordinances’ architectural review process.

## Legal Principles

- A municipality may regulate building design through architectural review when the regulation is reasonably related to the general welfare, including preserving neighborhood character and protecting surrounding property values.
- Aesthetic considerations may be used as part of land-use regulation when tied to concrete welfare objectives such as preventing harms to property values, rather than reflecting taste alone.
- Broad terms in land-use controls are not necessarily void for vagueness when the enactment, read as a whole and in light of its stated purposes, provides workable guidance that constrains administrative discretion.
- Delegation of plan-review authority to a specialized board is permissible when the legislative body supplies the governing objectives and criteria, and the board acts through structured procedures that reduce arbitrary decisionmaking.
- Denial of a building permit under a generally applicable land-use control does not constitute a compensable taking or denial of due process where the owner retains reasonable use of the property and may build in compliance with the standards.

## Conclusion

The court sustained Ladue’s architectural review scheme, holding that it permissibly allowed denial of a design incompatible with surrounding structures because the ordinance aimed at protecting property values and the community’s general welfare and provided sufficient standards and procedures to guide the Architectural Board’s discretion.


State ex rel. Stoyanoff v. Berkeley, 458 S.W.2d 305 (Mo. 1970)