  The role of magnetic fields in the chromospheric heating problem remains
greatly unconstrained. Most theoretical predictions from numerical models rely
on a magnetic configuration, field strength and connectivity whose details have
not been well established with observational studies. High-resolution studies
of chromospheric magnetic fields in plage are very scarce or non-existent in
general. Our aim is to study the stratification of the magnetic field vector in
plage regions. We use high-spatial resolution full-Stokes observations acquired
with CRISP instrument at the Swedish 1-m Solar Telescope in the Mg I
$\lambda$5173, Na I $\lambda$5896 and Ca II $\lambda$8542 lines. We have
developed a spatially-regularized weak-field approximation (WFA) method based
on the idea of spatial regularization. This method allows for a fast
computation of magnetic field maps for an extended field of view. The fidelity
of this new technique has been assessed using a snapshot from a realistic 3D
magnetohydrodynamics simulation. We have derived the depth-stratification of
the line-of-sight component of the magnetic field from the photosphere to the
chromosphere in a plage region. The magnetic fields are concentrated in the
intergranular lanes in the photosphere and expand horizontally toward the
chromosphere, filling all the space and forming a canopy. Our results suggest
that the lower boundary of this canopy must be located around 400-600 km from
the photosphere. The mean canopy total magnetic field strength in the lower
chromosphere ($z\approx760$ km) is 658 G. At $z=1160$ km we estimate
$<B_\parallel>\approx 417$ G. We propose a modification to the WFA that
improves its applicability to data with worse signal-to-noise ratio. These
methods provide a quick and reliable way of studying multi-layer magnetic field
observations without the many difficulties inherent to other inversion methods.
