About our Firm

Making Confident Decisions  

Quality, value, durability and delivery are central to the work that we do for our clients. This is based on a very structured decision-delivery process which enables our clients to make confident decisions. We use this process because we have heard clients at the start of a project express the fear that they are “getting on a highway without off-ramps”; or in other words, that there is no way to change course if conditions change related to program scope creep, cost increases and schedule delays. Our process eliminates this concern.  

Participant Centred Process  

Our participant-centred, co-creation process is shaped specifically so that decisions are made incrementally, based on a defined criteria for success that was established at the outset of the project. These criteria are re-assessed at defined points through the process, so as to ensure successful outcomes. These assessment points review the project’s scope, cost, quality, function and how to limit its impact on existing operations. The assessments are based on a metric we call the Defined Criteria for Success. 

Co-creation

Key to the firm’s success is its ability to apply the research of globally recognized leaders in the fields of group decision-making and the co-creation process. The “hands-on” methodology used by Farrow’s facilitators has been designed to actively engage participants in expanding their options. This approach leads to greater opportunities for the same cost and allows clients to make more knowledgeable choices. 

Farrow’s national and international reach is represented by a portfolio of diverse projects across North America, the Caribbean, Asia, Africa and both the Israeli and Arab Middle East. The firm understands regional, cultural and environmental needs and responds with thoughtful and sustainable designs that meet local and international standards. For these projects, Farrow partners with local firms that provide a variety of on-the-ground services for the team. 

Farrow is recognized as a world leader on the subject of how the built environment can ‘cause health.’  Tye Farrow has been invited to present his ideas and examples on this theme at some of the leading institutions in the world including the Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Clinic.  He has also presented at conferences in Singapore SG, Kuala Lumpur ML, Helsinki FI, Haifa IL, Tel Aviv IL, London UK, Glasgow UK, Manchester UK, Frankfurt DE, Milan IT, Cape Town ZA, Dubai UAE, Seoul KR, Auckland NZ, Welling-ton NZ, Christchurch NZ, Sydney AU, Vancouver CA, Edmonton CA, Toronto CA, St John’s CA, Boston MA, Charlottesville VA, Washington DC, Richmond VA, Atlanta GA, Dallas TX, College Station, TX, and Chicago IL. 

Farrow’s ideas and projects have been published in numerous publications, books and newspaper around the world, including: the Globe and Mail, the Report on Business, the National Post, the Toronto Star, the Canadian Broadcast Corporation, the UK Daily Mail, the UAE National, Fast Company, World Health Design, Azure, Canadian Architect, Architectural Review, Canadian Journal of Green Building and Design, SAB Magazine, Southern Design & Building Magazine,  UK’s AD Architectural Design, the Volvo Car magazine, UK’s FX, Jim Taggart’s book “Toward a Culture of Wood Architecture,” Lisa Rochon’s book “Up North,” Christine Nickl-Weller’s book “Masterpieces: Hospital Architecture and Design,” the Ryerson School of Design’s book “Canada Innovates: Sustainable Buildings” and Robin Guenther’s book “Sustainable Health Architecture.” 

Farrow has won numerous recognitions and awards from around the world, including: the World Congress on Design and Health’s inaugural World Architect Award; the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada’s Award of Excellence for Innovation in Architecture; a number of Ontario Association of Architects Design Excellence awards; an Ontario Association of Architects Innovative Practice Award; Nova Scotia

Lieutenant Governor’s Design Award of Merit; and numerous Academy for Design and Health Design Excellence Awards.

The Stockholm-based World Congress on Design and Health has identified Tye Farrow as a global leader who is making “a significant contribution to health and humanity through the medium of architecture and design.” Hospitality Design Magazine has deemed Farrow globally one of “nineteen earth champions and wellness visionaries who are changing what it means to do good.”

 

Sustainability

Farrow’s recently opened Sechelt project in British Columbia has been recognized as arguably North America’s ‘greenest’ building of its type. Designed to be carbon-neutral, in addition to a high-performance building envelope, the project includes 125 boreholes, each 250 feet deep, to provide zero-carbon energy for heating and cooling for the building distributed through radiant slabs. 

 

A 19-kilowatt photovoltaic array provides electricity, the largest of its type of building in British Columbia. A green roof which, along with white roofs, reduces solar heat gain. Passive design strategies, such as the use of solar shading and operable windows, allow for natural ventilation. Lighting is equipped with occupancy sensors and exhaust air recovery ventilation. As a result, the project is on target to achieve a 40-per-cent energy savings when compared to other LEED Gold certified hospitals.

 

Farrow’s sustainable design leadership includes a number of LEED rated buildings, including the carbon-neutral Sechelt project, along with: Bluewater Health in Ontario, the first and largest LEED certified project of its type in Canada; the LEED certified Colchester East Hants project in Nova Scotia; and the LEED gold Mission CCC project in British Columbia.

Accuracy, Value Management and Construction Delivery Strategies  

Our firm employs BIM computer technology and integrated design process systems to increase accuracy and improve project value. For most of our healthcare projects, we have encouraged our clients to engage construction managers early on in the process, so they can add preconstruction constructability and valuable advice to the design solutions under consideration, versus the traditional design-draw-tender process to general contactors. Such a collaborative client-architect-engineering-constructor approach has allowed us to achieve ‘beauty on a budget’ for our clients that have fixed, limited budgets, without limiting programming, impact and long-term plant/systems and building durability.

Farrow International

Farrow’s international reach is represented by a portfolio of diverse projects in the Europe, Caribbean, Asia, Africa and both the Israeli and Arab Middle East. The projects include: The Mater Private Hospital, Dublin, Ireland, Dublin’s largest private hospital; Shaare Zedec Medical Centre, Jerusalem, Israel, one of the countries most prestigious hospitals; Kaplan Medical Centre, Tel Aviv, Israel, three projects, including a 60-acre hospital master plan, the new Harzfeld Hospital and a new cardiology hospital all for the largest not-for-profit health provider in the country; Bermuda, a master plan for a public private hospital pursuit; Singapore, a master plan for a new hospital; Trinidad, a new flagship cancer centre for the English-speaking Caribbean; Qatar, a new 700,000 square foot hospital, integrated health centre and stand-alone health centre presently under construction; a master plan for the new Sherborne School in Doha, Qatar; South Africa, resulting from an international design competition for a Health Promoting Lifestyle Centre, the prototype facility is to be built by the Ministry of Health through the nine provinces, in the cities, townships and rural areas of the country.