Ary Mardi Wibowo : (JP/Ika Krismantari)

When it comes to combining two opposite things and turning them into a powerful combination, architect and entrepreneur Ary Mardi Wibowo is undoubtedly the expert.

One example of his successful amalgamations was when Ary integrated business and social approaches — the world’s two most contradicting principles — in his business and make them worked.

Ary is the man behind Artmosvere, a creative business community, whose main focus is to empower street kids.

The organization runs its business in several areas, spanning from architecture and design, which are Ary’s specialities, to steel and used-material manufacturing to help underprivileged youth.

“There has been a war going on between the socialists and capitalists. It is forbidden to talk about profit when you are on a social mission and vice versa. But, I try to remain in between,” the man said in a recent interview.

Ary believed that it was impossible to carry out a social mission without enough capital. A social organization should also think about generating profit so they can maximize their work and be sustainable, he thinks.

“If you just depend only on funding and sponsorships, how can you provide the best facilities for the children?” he asked.

This idea of profits-for-charity first emerged when Ary was involved in the Rumah Kreatif (creative house) project. Ary initiated the project in 2007 with the help of a foundation that takes care of street children and through a sponsorship from a foreign bank.

He recruited seven street children from the foundation and built the house, which was designed to become a center for unfortunate children to hone their skills. Once the project finished, Ary realized that he could do more with the children and their talents.

He was not wrong after all. Today, Rumah Kreatif is home to 20 talented former street children and has created several profitable business units under Artmosvere management.

“We have an artwork unit with paintings as a one of the products and this is crazy, the cheapest price for a painting is Rp 1.5 million [US$156] and the most expensive is Rp 16 million, with the average price ranging between Rp 5 million to Rp 10 million,” he proudly said.

With this success, Ary has shown that he can turn a social mission into a business for a greater purpose with the profits from the business units in Rumah Kreatif being channeled to other street children empowerment programs.

Apart from being a devoted social activist, Ary is still an architect. He explained that a portion of the profits from his work were allocated to support his company’s social program. These dual roles, once again, is a part of his success story in creating synergy, but this time, between his career and social activities.

“I believe in the power of synergy to achieve a certain purpose,” explained Ary.

Born in Semarang, Central Java, the 36-year-old said he had always known that he wanted to become an architect ever since he was 4-years-old.

“Every time my parents took me to a wedding reception I brought a bag filled with drawing tools and just drew without paying attention to the crowds,” he laughed, recalling the past.

More than 30 years since then, Ary is living his own dream, as a professional architect with his own firm. But, the architecture graduate takes a different approach with regard to his profession.

“The purpose of architecture is not simply about designing buildings, but it is also about designing a better life,” he remarked.

The turning point in his life occurred in 2006, right after he resigned from an architecture firm and started his own.

“I started scribbling on a piece of paper about Artmosvere, about it being a creative community, which dedicates itself to train street kids. I even went into details with the plan to build a youth center and workshop,” he said.

Amazingly, in less than 10 years, the plan panned out.

Everyone must think, how does he do it?

At first glance, Ary is no different from any average guy wearing a batik shirt, carrying around his phone and iPad, but after hearing him speak articulately about his passions and exemplifying an energetic spirit during the interview, one can come to understand how he realized his ambitions.

He is a great thinker with fresh ideas, revealing that he came up with most of his ideas while contemplating in a closet.

“To arouse my creativity, I have to spend a lot of time in the closet. That is best for me”, he shared with laughter.

Ary never quits. He refuses to quit when challenges appear. Instead, he sees a challenge as an opportunity to create better solutions.

Now that the man has almost realized all his dreams, he keeps saying, “Dream as big as possible, as crazy as possible, for good purpose,”

Even after achieving great things through Artmosvere, the man still continues to dream. His next plans include building 100 more Rumah Kreatif’s throughout Indonesia and to open a school with a system that is designed to address the education problems in Indonesia.

Slowly but surely, Ary has made little steps to achieve those goals. Among them, Ary says he has started a Rumah Kreatif project in Nias, North Sumatra and planned to build another in Yogyakarta.

Ary is definitely not your average architect. He doesn’t just design buildings as a job, but he designs them to create a better life.

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