We build slowly,
in places
already lived in.

Brooklyn · Hudson Valley · Catskills
est. 2013 — registered NY, NJ, CT

Selected works

selected works · 06 of 24
+ 18 further projects in the archive View the full archive →

Studio philosophy

three short positions · written 2019, revised 2024
01

Buildings are evidence of the lives that came before.

We approach every site as an archive — a hand-pegged joist, a coal chute, a layer of horsehair plaster. Our first month on a project is almost entirely measuring, drawing, and asking. We do not arrive with a style.

02

Restraint is the discipline. Not the aesthetic.

We are skeptical of architectural moves that announce themselves. Most of the work in adaptive reuse is invisible — drainage, rot remediation, party-wall thermal bridges, unflashy detailing that lasts thirty winters.

03

A small studio answering its own phone.

Six people. Five to seven commissions per year. Maren reviews every set of drawings. We turn down more work than we accept, and we stay on site through CA. It is the only way we know how to work.

The studio

six · brooklyn · 2013–present
Maren FennFounder, AIA
Principal architect
Idris OkonkwoSenior associate
Adaptive reuse lead
Hana VelascoProject architect
Landmarks & preservation
Cyrus LimProject architect
Detailing & CA
June HartwellDesigner
Drawings & archive
Tomás ReillyStudio manager
Operations
press & index · selected coverage · 2018 — 2025
Dwell The New York Times Apartamento Architectural Record Curbed Wallpaper* Domus Brownstoner