Kanye West tried to build 'Star Wars'-inspired domes for the homeless, but LA officials just forced him to tear them down

The dwellings were supposed to be temporary prototypes, but a Los Angeles county inspector said they looked permanent .
Instead of securing the necessary permits, West opted to tear the homes down.
West recently purchased a a $14 million ranch in Wyoming , which could give him more space and fewer regulations if he were to attempt a similar project there.
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Kanye West learned a big lesson about affordable-housing development last week: You can't bypass a permit.

Four dome structures were recently torn down on West's 300-acre property in Calabasas, California, TMZ reported. The structures, designed as prototypes for homeless housing, came out of an architecture initiative called Yeezy Home part of the the rapper-turned-entrepreneur's design empire, Yeezy.

Images of the domes, first published by TMZ, showed a collection of futuristic mounds covered by a tidy grid of wooden slats.The domes were inspired by "Star Wars," specifically the settlements on the desert planet of Tatooine. Those fictional homes' namesake is Tataouine, a city in Tunisia with sand-colored dwellings that resemble stacked caves.

Tatooinecity Veronique Debord/Flickr/Wikimedia Commons

In July, construction on West's housing prototypes in Calabasas grew loud enough that neighbors complained to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Works. That led county officials to discover that West had not secured the proper permits to build the domes on his land.

TMZ reported that West's homes were supposed to be temporary structures (they're prototypes, after all), but an LA county inspector took issue with the fact that they were built on a concrete base, which signaled that they could be permanent.

The Department of Public Works gave the rapper 45 days to either acquire the necessary permits or tear the homes down. About a week before the deadline, three of the prototypes had been demolished.

Wests plan to become a major developer could have better luck in Wyoming

West has expressed a desire to someday develop entire cities.

"I'm going to be one of the biggest real estate developers of all time, like what Howard Hughes was to aircrafts and what Henry Ford was to cars," West said in an interview with radio and television personality Charlamagne Tha God. "I'm tired of the McMansions, all the Spanish roof homes and stuff like that."

kanye west ranch 4x3 Agostini/Invision/AP; J. P. King Auction Company

In LA, there's certainly a need for more affordable housing. The city has more than 36,000 homeless residents a 16% increase since 2018. But the number of housing permits awarded by the city is expected to drop by 12% from 2018 to 2019.

Most of LA's residential land is still zoned for single-family properties, which restricts the amount of land available for new affordable housing.

LA Mayor Eric Garcetti has even encountered obstacles in his efforts to help homeowners install accessory dwelling units for the homeless in their backyards he previously told Business Insider that construction costs can be prohibitively high.

Should West choose to re-build the domes or create new ones, he may have better luck in Wyoming, where he recently purchased a $14 million ranch that spans around 3,000 acres.

With less than 650 homeless residents, Wyoming doesn't have the same pressing need for new affordable housing, but it could be more amenable to new construction. The state's number of residential building permits rose nearly 12% from 2016 to 2017 (the last year for which data was available).

There's also a lower chance that neighbors will complain about noisy construction.

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Kanye West tried to build 'Star Wars'-inspired domes for the homeless, but LA officials just forced him to tear them down

Wests plan to become a major developer could have better luck in Wyoming

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