Ark-shelter is an architecture studio founded by architects Martin Mikovčák and Michiel De Backer in 2015, based in Lichtervelde, Belgium. Specializing in modular buildings, Ark-shelter has completed approximately 300 different modules installed throughout Europe.
They started as two architectural students, beginning to think about how people live their lives nowadays. In today’s fast-paced world, we've fallen into a continuous loop of pressures and deadlines that stresses and overwhelms. They’ve found a way to escape from this stressed life and return to the roots. They believe that by incorporating nature back into our lives, people will find the break they need.
That’s how ark-shelter philosophy was born, and they built their first compact cabin. They integrated all the necessary objects we need to survive in the heart of nature, being totally off-grid with solar panels, batteries, and recovery water systems.
Today they are still moving forward as a hybrid of workshop-studio of architects and craftsmen, researching the limits of their cabin-modular building system.
They have been nominated for the Real-estate of the year 2016 awards and have received the Birdhouse startup award and the Big See Architecture Award in 2019.
Martin Mikovčák was born in 1992 in Čadca, Slovakia. He graduated in 2017 from the Faculty of Architecture at the Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava and in 2019 from the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava, Slovakia.
Michiel De Backer was born in 1991 in Bruges, Belgium. He graduated from the Faculty of Architecture at KU Leuven in Ghent, Belgium.
