Our work begins with the particular conditions of a project—site, program, material, construction, history, economy and use—and with the relationships that can be found between them. Rather than applying a predetermined language, we use these conditions to generate work specific to its place and circumstance.
Across buildings, interiors, objects, research and teaching, the practice is interested in how space is experienced and understood: how materials establish boundaries, how old and new structures meet, how movement alters perception, and how familiar building types can be reconsidered through construction and use. Research and making are therefore not separate from practice; they are tools for finding possibilities within the constraints of real projects.
Paperfarm works closely with clients, fabricators, engineers, builders and project partners to carry those ideas into built form. The ambition is straightforward: to make work that is thoughtful in conception, precise in construction and generous in the way it is lived.
From its Providence studio at 426 Washington Street, Paperfarm develops work in buildings, interiors, objects and research across New England and beyond, alongside the practice’s continuing work in Taipei and Asia.
Jarrett Boor studied architecture at Georgia Institute of Technology and Parsons School of Design. His work moves between design practice, teaching and research, with a particular interest in how perception, memory and cultural histories shape the experience of space.
He has taught architectural theory, visualization and representation at the undergraduate and graduate levels, including at the University of Hartford and New York Institute of Technology, and has led workshops at Syracuse University. His research and independent work extend beyond buildings to drawing, objects, furniture and physical studies that investigate division, collective memory, geometry and the ways architecture can register different readings of place.
Travel and research across the Middle East, North Africa, Asia and Europe have informed an approach to design that values specificity over predetermined solutions and understands architecture through relationships between people, material, history and place.
Daniel Yao studied architecture at Georgia Institute of Technology and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. His work moves between design practice, teaching and a sustained interest in photography and the observation of everyday urban life.
He has taught undergraduate architecture studios and theory at Taipei Tech in Taipei, as well as visualization, theory and representation at New York Institute of Technology, and has led workshops at Syracuse University. Alongside his design work, Daniel photographs extensively and maintains a collection of vintage cameras, using photography as a way of observing how people occupy, adapt and give identity to cities and buildings.
Travel and documentation across Asia, the Americas and Europe have informed an approach attentive to the ordinary conditions of urban life—material, occupation, culture and change—and to the ways design can respond to them without erasing their particular character.