Stephanie Forsythe and Todd MacAllen are not paper architects in the traditional sense. Partners in life as well as business, the two founders and design principals of the Vancouver-based firm Molo share an enduring fascination with making things. Their preoccupation with process informs a growing body of work that ranges from an architectonic glass tea service to modular paper walls to a whimsically fluid museum in Japan set to open early next year. Indeed, the name Molo, a playful acronym for “middle ones little ones,” reflects the size and form of this multidisciplinary design and production studio’s output: small (furnishings and products) and medium (interior structures and exhibitions) in addition to large (buildings).

As students, both Forsythe and MacAllen supplemented degrees in environmental studies and architecture with schooling in stonework and fine art (MacAllen has a B.F.A.), printmaking, glass blowing, furniture design, metalwork, woodworking, and ceramics (Forsythe). A stint designing and building houses from the mid-’90s to early ’00s bolstered their hands-on ethic and taught them the value of collaborating with top-notch tradespeople. But the realities of running a small custom firm kept the partners from spreading their creative wings. “We learned that we’re not oriented to working with [private] clients and that we actually just like doing projects that we come up with,” notes MacAllen.