Andrew Gower’s relationship to design is multi-faceted. His primary work as an industrial designer has been informed by a career that has spanned many avenues of design.  With decades of training and experience, Andrew sees each project as an opportunity to explore new and different ways people interact in their environments. Having been afforded a wide range of design opportunities from office buildings to tableware, Andrew has developed a unique aesthetic that has been shaped by understanding the impact and import of the objects we humans create.  With more than a hundred licensed products, Andrew’s award-winning designs can be found in almost every avenue of the furniture industry.

From an early age Andrew was drawn by an innate desire to build and create. Schooled in architecture, engineering, and sculpture, he has developed a versatile and holistic approach to design. Andrew understands that successful design requires an agile and dynamic approach and that each project is unique creating its own challenges and opportunities. He is at his best engaged with projects of varied type and scale that require unconventional solutions. Today, he finds his work leading him outside the traditional role of a designer helping others refine, re-envision or rebrand businesses. 

Andrew on travel: 

“Throughout my life, I have enjoyed the freedom to roam out in the world and appease my wanderlust. I learned early on that if I immerse myself in places and cultures far from my home, I will always be open to seeing the world anew. To be on the road is to remain open, questioning, challenged, and in mystery. As designers we create in order to facilitate new and different ways of living and working. I am often humbled and inspired to see how others envision and create for their unique place in the world. By understanding the uniqueness of other cultures, I evolve my understanding of design beyond the context of my own culture. My travels have afforded me the opportunity to expand my perspective and deepen my understanding of how we co-exist with our natural and built world. I am intrigued by how each culture produces their own unique objects that support their daily lives. Each social structure and institution inhabits its own particular place and each has a different way of informing the objects in their environment. As creatives we are obligated to find ways to expand our vision and perspective for what can be. As designers we are the authors of the objects and artifacts of our generation.”

Paul Woolf Boettiger brings to GOWER+WOOLF a warm modernist sensibility and a lifelong obsession with form. Trained in industrial design and rooted in the culture of the modern American craft movement, he is committed to the centrality of simplicity, detail and materiality.

Paul developed an early respect for the value of beauty growing up in a family of artists and psychologists, eventually leading to Rhode Island School of Design where he studied furniture design.

Paul has worked extensively for architecture firms in the San Francisco Bay Area, studied with prominent studio furniture makers and ran his own multidisciplinary design studio with an emphasis on modern heirloom-quality custom furniture. Drawn to human-centric design that not only attracts the eye but the whole body, Paul’s process is rooted in knowing the objects we live and work with influence our well-being. Striking the balance of the visual, haptic, and material experience is what truly makes a project successful.

Paul on making:

“Whether it’s putting pencil to paper, modeling out of clay or working with wood and metal, the simple act of creating something out of nothing never ceases to move me. There is a relational intimacy to the timeless hand-eye act of creating form. To see a rough concept arise out of an initial hand gesture into a successful tangible design one can live, work with or inhabit is very satisfying and mysterious to me. Making/designing has never felt like ‘work’ - it is a privilege to have found a process that aligns with where I feel most alive.”