In early 2019, THA began as a modest two-person studio. Peiying and I shared a small office in Vienna’s 3rd district. It was not much more than a desk in a big shared space and endless determination. Wherever we went, our two-person studio followed. That was us. Space and time were never a limit. A café table could become our studio. A living room corner could turn into a workplace. When we travelled, the studio travelled too — from Vienna to Rijeka, Rovinj, Banja Luka, Sarajevo, Shanghai, Chongqing, and Beijing. Sometimes we asked ourselves where we were heading. Checkpoints were uncertain, but it was ours — a place where late nights turned into mornings, where ideas were tested and reshaped, and where the foundations of THA slowly took form.
The beginning was special. Every project was personal. Each drawing carried the weight of ambition. There was no clear line between work and life; the studio was both. Looking back, those early days were not only about starting a business. They were about setting a rhythm, shaping a way of working that combined discipline, curiosity, and the joy of creating together.
Five years later, we stand in a different place — with more energy, and much more experience. THA is no longer part of a shared office but has its own identity and its own space. The desks are no longer just two; they are many. They carry a growing team, multiple screens, sketches, personal notes, and ideas in progress. What began with two architects has become a collective of colleagues, collaborators, and friends — people who bring expertise, creativity, and vision to every challenge. There is a story of what was, and a story of what is yet to come.
Growth in architecture is rarely linear. It comes with pauses, detours, and moments of recalibration. For us, growth meant learning how to balance independence with collaboration, how to manage projects of increasing scale without losing attention to detail, and how to keep experimentation alive even when deadlines pressed hard. It also meant building trust — with clients, with partners, and with ourselves. Trust that what we design is more than drawings and models; it is a shared responsibility for spaces that shape daily life.
Architecture, at its heart, has never been only about buildings. It is about people and places, the silent dialogue between material and light, between city and citizen. It is about the stories we create together, stories that become embedded in walls, courtyards, and streets.
Looking back from today’s perspective, we see more than completed projects. We see collaborations that became long-term partnerships, trust that was built and strengthened. We see challenges that pushed us further than expected. Most of all, we see a team that carries forward the same spirit that lived in the shared desk studio of 2019 — the belief that architecture can connect, inspire, and endure.
Above all, we are grateful. To our clients who trusted us, to our partners who worked alongside us, and to our colleagues who invested their skills and their hearts into making THA what it is today. The journey is far from over, but five years in, one thing is certain: the story of THA is built together.
