Chinenye Chukwuka is a Nigerian-born, Johannesburg-based architect, curator, and cultural practitioner whose work explores architecture as a spatial archive and tool for memory, resistance, and transformation, with a Master’s degree in Architecture (with distinction) from the University of Johannesburg’s Graduate School of Architecture.

Her thesis, The Metropolitan Mine, explored Johannesburg’s inner city as a palimpsest of extraction, migration, and informal agency, earning her several awards, including the Examiners’ Choice Award, the Corobrik Best Use of Clay Brick Award, and the GSA Women in Architecture Prize.

Chinenye currently works at Library Special Projects, a design-research studio focused on exhibition design and public storytelling. Here, she contributes to the design and content development of spatial narratives in museums and galleries, often working at the intersection of research, material culture, and immersive environments.

Chinenye’s practice moves fluidly between the built environment and curatorial strategies, investigating how design can shape new narratives in the global South. Her curatorial work includes Emergent Practice 1 and 2, as well as the Women’s Mobile Museum, in partnership with institutions such as the University of Johannesburg and the Goethe-Institut.

Chinenye’s approach foregrounds subversion, visibility, and the ethics of representation, particularly in how marginalised communities and hybrid identities are framed. She draws heavily from textiles, oral traditions, and informal economies, treating them as spatial strategies in themselves.