diff --git a/R/pkg-arrow.R b/R/pkg-arrow.R
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..00f01e1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/R/pkg-arrow.R
@@ -0,0 +1,96 @@
+
+GeoArrowType <- list()
+GeoArrowType$create <- function(...) {
+  stop("Package 'arrow' must be installed to use GeoArrowType")
+}
+
+
+has_arrow_extension_type <- function() {
+  inherits(GeoArrowType, "R6ClassGenerator")
+}
+
+register_arrow_extension_type <- function() {
+  GeoArrowType <<- R6::R6Class(
+    "GeoArrowType", inherit = arrow::ExtensionType,
+    public = list(
+      Deserialize = function() {
+        private$schema <- narrow::as_narrow_schema(self)
+      },
+      as_vector = function(array) {
+        wk_handle_wrapper(narrow::as_narrow_array_stream(array), NULL)
+      },
+      ToString = function() {
+        label <- gsub("^geoarrow\\.", "", self$extension_name())
+
+        crs <- self$crs
+        if (is.null(crs) || identical(crs, "")) {
+          crs <- "<unspecified>"
+        } else if (nchar(crs) > 30) {
+          crs <- paste0(substr(crs, 1, 27), "...")
+        }
+
+        edges <- self$edges
+        if (is.null(edges)) {
+          edges <- ""
+        } else {
+          edges <- paste0("(", edges, " edges)")
+        }
+
+        sprintf("%s %s%s", label, crs, edges)
+      }
+    ),
+    active = list(
+      crs = function() {
+        recursive_extract_narrow_schema(private$schema, "crs")
+      },
+      edges = function() {
+        recursive_extract_narrow_schema(private$schema, "edges")
+      }
+    ),
+    private = list(
+      schema = NULL
+    )
+  )
+
+  # This shouldn't be needed directly...these objects will get instantiated
+  # when the Type object gets surfaced to R provided that the extension types
+  # have been registered.
+  GeoArrowType$create <- function(schema) {
+    schema <- narrow::as_narrow_schema(schema)
+
+    # this is a bit of a hack and could probably be done better in narrow
+    ext <- scalar_chr(schema$metadata[["ARROW:extension:name"]])
+    metadata <- schema$metadata[["ARROW:extension:metadata"]]
+    schema$metadata[c("ARROW:extension:name", "ARROW:extension:metadata")] <- NULL
+    dummy_array <- narrow::narrow_array(schema, validate = FALSE)
+    storage_type <- narrow::from_narrow_array(
+      dummy_array,
+      # ...because arrow::DataType is not exported
+      asNamespace("arrow")$DataType
+    )
+
+    arrow::new_extension_type(
+      storage_type = storage_type,
+      extension_name = ext,
+      extension_metadata = metadata,
+      type_class = GeoArrowType
+    )
+  }
+
+  representative_schemas <- list(
+    geoarrow_schema_wkb(),
+    geoarrow_schema_wkt(),
+    geoarrow_schema_point(),
+    geoarrow_schema_linestring(),
+    geoarrow_schema_polygon(),
+    geoarrow_schema_multipoint(),
+    geoarrow_schema_multilinestring(),
+    geoarrow_schema_multipolygon()
+  )
+
+  for (schema in representative_schemas) {
+    arrow::reregister_extension_type(
+      GeoArrowType$create(schema)
+    )
+  }
+}
diff --git a/R/zzz.R b/R/zzz.R
index ec33a7b..d257ac1 100644
--- a/R/zzz.R
+++ b/R/zzz.R
@@ -6,6 +6,10 @@
     s3_register("vctrs::vec_proxy", cls, vctr_proxy)
     s3_register("vctrs::vec_restore", cls, vctr_restore)
   }
+
+  if (requireNamespace("arrow", quietly = TRUE)) {
+    try(register_arrow_extension_type())
+  }
 }
 
 s3_register <- function(generic, class, method = NULL) {