Ukraine: Nataliia Chmutina

Born in 1912 in Kyiv in the Russian Empire (modern-day Ukraine), Nataliia Chmutina was one of the first professional women architects in Ukraine. She held a diploma from the faculty of architecture at the Kyiv Civil Engineering Institute in Kyiv in the Ukrainian SSR (1936); she completed her postgraduate studies at the Academy of Architecture of the Ukrainian SSR (1947), and was the first woman to earn Candidate of Architecture in Ukraine (c. 1952). Chmutina completed architectural designs in collaboration with other architects, including the Verkhovna Rada Project (c. 1936-1939). She also worked as an architect for the Department of Aviation Repair of Capital Construction at Plant No. 43 in Kyiv (1938-1941). Chmutina married architect Viktor Ivanovich Lazarenko (1940). During War War II, she evacuated from Kyiv, and she continued to work as an architect at the Rostekstilproekt Design Office in Aramilsky and Ivanovo (1942-1943); she also worked at the Institute of Folk Art of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR in Moscow (1944). Chmutina returned to Kyiv after the war and assisted with the post-war restoration efforts. She also worked in academia as a professor at the Kyiv State Art Institute (1971–1999). Chmutina was a member of the National Union of Architects of Ukraine (1936), the Union of Architects of the Ukrainian SSR (1967-1968), the Town Planning Council in Kyiv, and an honorary member of the Ukrainian Academy of Architecture (1992). She earned the title of “People’s Architect of the Ukrainian SSR” (1987). Chmutina died in 2005 in Kyiv.