Architecture Background Office (ABO) is an architecture, interiors, and decorative arts firm that creates people-focused spaces. Marc McQuade, a licensed architect, started the firm in 2024 with the goal of creating buildings which are beautiful, comfortable, productive, and with the belief that well-conceived and responsibly built architecture provides the background for positive shifts in the world.

Marc McQuade, AIA, brings over twenty years of experience working with renowned leaders in the design professions on a diverse range of projects spanning various locations, types, and scales. Before founding ABO, Marc was Associate Principal at Adjaye Associates, where he co-led the New York office. Over his fourteen years there, he oversaw the design and construction of numerous significant projects across North America, including buildings, interiors, competitions, exhibitions, and furniture pieces. Key projects include 130 William, an 800-foot residential tower in downtown Manhattan; the Princeton University Art Museum, a 144,000-square-foot arts complex on campus; Richard Avedon Murals + Portraits at the Gagosian Gallery; The Webster retail store in Los Angeles; the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C.; Sugar Hill, an affordable housing, preschool, and children’s museum in Harlem; Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure, a traveling exhibition; and Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Centennial Park in Detroit.

Marc is a dual citizen of the United States and Switzerland, born in New York and raised both there and in the Bay Area. He received a Bachelor of Arts from U.C. Berkeley, where he competed nationally on the Cal Taekwondo team. After several years working at an architecture firm in Switzerland, he earned a Master’s Degree from the Princeton University School of Architecture, where he was awarded the Alpha Rho Chi Medal for leadership and service.

Marc is the Fall 2024 Gensler Visiting Critic at Cornell University. He has taught architectural design at Princeton University and the University of Toronto and frequently serves on architectural juries and panels. He is the editor of Authoring: Re-placing Art and Architecture, a founding editor of Pidgin magazine, and co-editor of Landform Building: Architecture’s New Terrain with Stan Allen. He lives in New York City with his wife and two children.

Abraham Murrell is an architect with a focus on equity and sustainability. He joins Background Office after five years of close collaboration with Marc McQuade and over a decade of experience working with leaders in the construction and fabrication industries. Abraham is deeply committed to community partnerships, collaboration, and craftsmanship. As a project lead at Adjaye Associates, Abraham contributed to the design of significant projects, including the exhibition Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure, the Princeton University Art Museum, and Sycamore & Oak—a 650,000 SF mixed-use affordable housing and economic opportunity model. Before joining Adjaye Associates, he worked with several studios, including Sharon Davis Design, where he contributed to the Bayalpata Hospital, a non-profit healthcare campus in Nepal.

Abraham is an adjunct professor at Columbia GSAPP and has taught at Delft Technical University and the University of Maryland. He has participated in critiques at the Cooper Union and Parsons and serves on curriculum and admissions committees.

He holds a Master of Architecture from Columbia GSAPP, where he was awarded the McKim Prize for Design Excellence, along with leadership and student body engagement awards. Abraham is also the co-founder of Another Studio, an architecture collective. He has raised funds and built homes with Habitat for Humanity across the U.S., is a member of the Mount Fuji Wood Culture Society, and enjoys bicycle touring.