Parallel Design is a collaborative studio between designer Lisa Wasserman Sivan and architect Miriam Tropp Spear.

Design, like language, evolves over time and is textured with varied influences, continuously taking on new shapes.  Parallel’s work speaks of our combined practices, perspectives, skills, and creativity.

Our partnership is built on a shared aesthetic, commitment to detail and craftsmanship, and a joyful experimentation with the spaces in which we live and work.

Lisa Wasserman Sivan Co-Founder + Partner

Lisa is a Brookline-based designer. Since 1997, Lisa has worked collaboratively to design and build residences in New York, Chicago, Northern California, and Boston. In 2015, she launched a shared workspace that later formed a partnership, The Village Works, to develop coworking in the Brookline and Jamaica Plain communities. In Parallel, Lisa’s design work includes hospitality and commercial projects.

Lisa holds a BA in Art History and Archaeology from Columbia University and a BFA in Interior Architecture and Design from Harrington College.

Miriam Tropp Spear, AIA Co-Founder + Partner

Miriam is a registered architect with 20+ years of design-focused experience across a variety of scales and project types.

Miriam’s experience is in the design of cultural and civic institutions. Projects include The Lawrenceville Academy School of Music in Princeton, the Brickell Bridge in Miami, the Kollel Center for Advanced Talmudic Study in Boston, and the repurposing of St. Teresa’s in Providence. She is concurrently the Principal of Spear Design Group, whose work continues to deliver designs that are uplifting, meaningful, and memorable. 

Miriam received a Master of Architecture in Urban Design from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Miami. 

Katarina Richter-Lunn Designer

Katarina is an architectural designer and researcher pursuing her Doctorate of Design at Harvard GSD. Her primary research lies at the intersection of design, psychology, and neuroscience to address mental well-being through our environment. As part of this work, she explores perception through the lens of material development, computational design, affective computing, and robotics.

Katarina holds a Master's in Design Technology from Harvard GSD and a Bachelor of Architecture from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, with a minor in Sustainable Environments. She has worked at leading firms including Snøhetta, Arup, IwamottoScott, and most recently Gehry Partners, where she worked as a project designer for three years.

Omer Gabay

Omer is a trained architect with experience in a variety of different projects, scales and typologies. 

He grew up and was trained in Israel. While in Israel, Omer worked on several projects in the public domain - office buildings, a financial institute, health care facilities and labs. After moving to the US, Omer transitioned to the residential side and has worked on projects varying is size and scale, from bathroom renovations to gut renovations and new construction. 

Omer holds a Bachelor of Architecture from the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology.