Xinyu Chen is an architectural designer, educator, amateur writer and photographer. She currently teaches architecture at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. She holds a Post-Professional M.Arch II degree with a graduate certificate in Media + Modernity from Princeton University, and a Bachelor of Architecture degree with a minor in environmental studies from Rice University.
Before Cal Poly, Xinyu was an editor of Rumor and of PLAT. She worked as an Instructor at Syracuse University and as an Assistant Instructor at Princeton University. Her academic research and works are published in Paprika!, Rumor, Tangent Essays, and presented at various symposiums and conferences worldwide.
Xinyu is a recipient of the AIA Henry Adams Medal, The Robert and Evelyn Geddes Award, Fay H. Spencer Memorial Scholarship in Architecture, and multiple other awards and fellowships issued by Princeton University, Rice University, and the Texas Architectural Foundation.
Aside from academia, Xinyu has practiced at renowned architectural firms including Renzo Piano Building Workshop, Stan Allen Architect, and Isozaki + HuQian Partners (Arata Isozaki & Associates). She worked on both conceptual design and construction details. Her architectural works investigate human experience of the built environment at diverse scales, and critically reflect on the architectural medium’s situatedness within a greater media landscape.
Additionally, Xinyu has experience working with exhibitions and museums. She used to be a curator for the Architecture Society at Rice, and a communications intern for the Moody Center for the Arts. Recently, her work is featured at a83 gallery, Black Box Gallery, and more.
Xinyu's research interest lies in the experience of otherness in the built environment, and the visual representations thereof. Whether it is the appropriation of diasporic artifacts in American domesticity, or the internalization of nature into architecture’s conditioned space, she probes the historical underpinning of marginal experiences, and she aspires to promote inclusivity by means of design and writing.
Contact: xinyu.cecilia.chen@gmail.com
Portfolio: for PDF portfolio please contact me at xinyu.cecilia.chen@outlook.com