Bill Austin has been living in the Pioneer Valley since 1969, first as a student at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, then as a carpenter and builder, and since 1984 as an architect. From 1984 to 1993 he was a principal with Kitchell and Austin, Architecture and Community Design, located in the center of Amherst. From 1993 to 2000 he worked out of his home and an office in Shelburne Falls. In 2000 he bought a two-room schoolhouse in Colrain with his partner Joan Rockwell which is now the office of Austin Design, Inc. & Joan S. Rockwell & Associates.

Chris Farley is a Massachusetts licensed architect who began working for Austin Design full time in 1999 after moving to the Hilltowns from Boston and a job at Cambridge 7 Associates. His primary focus prior to working for Bill was exhibit design, including museum projects as far away as Kuwait and Alaska. He received his BArch from Carnegie Mellon University.