BROWSER UPGRADE RECOMMENDED

Our website has detected that you are using a browser that will prevent you from accessing certain features. An upgrade is recommended to experience the full features of the MKCA website. Use the links below to upgrade your exisiting browser.
If you feel you have reached this page in error, click here to continue to the site.

Michael K. Chen

Michael K. Chen established MKCA in 2011 in New York City.

The practice is widely recognized for buildings, interiors, and objects that embrace material expression, that elegantly choreograph space, and that embody innovative and thoughtful approaches to craft. Through a process that is considered, collaborative, and inclusive, MKCA is invested in linking the material and social worlds, based on the belief that design creates impact through its participants, materials, and making.

Michael and MKCA’s growing body of work regularly appears in international exhibitions and media including Architectural Digest,ELLE Decor, Domus, Dwell, Interior Design, Architectural Record, Wallpaper*, The Daily Mail, The New York Times, and T: The New York Times Style Magazine, and it has been recognized with numerous awards for design excellence, research, contributions to the design disciplines, and for social good.

In March of 2020, he co-founded Design Advocates, a network of independent architecture and design firms collaborating on projects and initiatives that promote equality in the built environment. Design Advocates has grown to encompass 250 firms and volunteers who have completed over 100 projects serving communities and the public good.

Michael studied architecture at the University of California, Berkeley (AB) and Columbia University (M.Arch) and was the John Dinkeloo Fellow at the American Academy in Rome. He is a Registered Architect, a Fellow of the Urban Design Forum, and a member of the American Institute of Architects.

Braden Caldwell

Braden Caldwell has been design lead on several high-end townhouse and brownstone projects integrating modern additions and building systems with delicate, historic contexts, and detailed interior design and detailing. As an Associate, Braden manages project teams within the studio and provides technical, aesthetic, and client service oversight. Among his responsibilities, he has also spearheaded much the office’s micro-housing work and research as well as the development of MKCA’s interior design practice area. He has lead the completion of several complex, fabrication-intensive, and micro projects, including MKCA’s  Pied à Mer,  5:1 Apartment, and Attic Transformer projects, as a brownstone in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn which have been published extensively in print and online. Braden earned a B.Arch from Pratt Institute.

Natasha Harper

Natasha Harper has been the project lead for a number of projects with collaborative detail-oriented integration of architecture and interior design, including MKCA’s first health care project, a community clinic for Wyckoff Heights Medical Center, and numerous high end residential projects including the Watershed House  and the Carnegie Hill Apartment. As an Associate, Natasha manages project teams within the studio and provides technical, aesthetic, and client service oversight.

Natasha came to MKCA with extensive experience with Diller Scofidio + Renfro and the Rockwell Group, developing a high rise hotel and commercial tower for the Hudson Yards redevelopment, and experience as a senior designer and project manager at Roy Co. and at Open Shop Studio where she was responsible for numerous high end hospitality and commercial projects. She earned a B. Arch from Pratt Institute and an M.Arch from Harvard.

 

 

Rachel Lefevre

Rachel Lefevre studied architecture at Washington University and Yale, where she received an M. Arch and was the Teaching Fellow for Environmental Design, providing instruction on energy modeling and environmental analysis. Prior to joining MKCA, Rachel worked in small firms in St Louis and with Anthony Acciavatti at Yale on an exhibition at the Seoul Biennale of research on the Ganges River Basin.

 

Guillermo Acosta Navarrete

Bachelors of Architecture, Tecnológico de Monterrey, Mexico City
Masters of Architecture, Yale University

Alejandra Avalos Guerrero

B.Arch Tecnólogico de Monterrey

M.Arch Harvard University

Matt Malcom

B.Arch, Pratt Institute

Inmo Kang

BA Architecture, Washington University

M.Arch, Harvard University

Katie Koerber

With a professional background in furniture and art conservation as well as in museum administration and marketing, Katie manages logistics and procurement at MKCA. Katie received a B.A in Art History at the University of Central Florida and a certification in Appraisal Studies in Fine and Decorative Arts at New York University.

Archie

Archibald “Archie” Chen-Beck Wiener is a red dapple miniature dachshund, and a design trainee at MKCA. Born in Buffalo, he moved to New York City to join MKCA when he was ten weeks old. We’re pretty sure he’s an aesthete of the first order, and a prodigy. He Instagrams at @archibaldwiener.

Milo

Milo Chen-Beck, Top Dachshund Emeritus watched over the early years of the practice, before retiring to puppy heaven in 2017. A lover of hard rubber toys, fake fur, and stuffed lobsters, he served for many years as food taster-in-chief at MKCA, reflecting his upbringing in the Meatpacking District and Chinatown and his Californian, Southwestern, Chinese, and Jewish family background.

Profile

MKCA is a design practice dedicated to creating innovative and meticulously crafted work across an exceptionally wide range of clients, project types, and contexts. Our work includes buildings, interiors, and objects, as well as historic rehabilitations, new construction, and international commissions. We approach each project with agility, curiosity, and a highly tailored design approach. Across these diverse projects, we choreograph space, embrace material expression, and pursue inventive approaches to craft. Through a process that is rigorous, collaborative, and considered, we strive to connect making with meaning with the belief that excellent design creates impact through its materials, its participants, and the care embedded in its processes. Motivated by curiosity and a love of drawing, tinkering, and conversation, our work balances deep technical expertise with a close understanding of our clients’ values and ways of living, working, and gathering. We develop design responses that are specific to each project, each site, and each client. Our focus is always on creating buildings and spaces that are intelligent, beautifully well-made, and a genuine pleasure to live in and use. We are work on new houses in the Hudson Valley and Upstate New York, renovations and decoration of brownstones, townhouses, apartments, and lofts in Manhattan and Brooklyn, spaces for art, workspaces for community organizations, and architecture and interior design projects in Paris and the South of France.

Learn more about us and our services here