Zaha Hadid’s prolific, admired, and influential body of work led to hundreds of invitations to lecture around the world. Through her contemporaries’ heartfelt introductions, we can appreciate her groundbreaking architectural approach in a world which often appeared to be one step behind her ideas and enthusiasm.
Zaha Hadid: The Latest Architecture and News
Reflections on Zaha Hadid: A Compilation of Introductory Remarks
AD Readers Debate: RIP Zaha Hadid
Of course, the top story in recent weeks has been the sudden death of Dame Zaha Hadid, who passed away last week in Miami. At just 65 years of age, and at the height of her powers as an architect, the news of Hadid’s passing was a shock to many and unsurprisingly was met with grief from many of our readers. Read on to see what tributes those readers left, along with opinions on other stories from recent weeks.
Tributes Pour in With News of Zaha Hadid's Passing
Zaha Hadid's sudden passing has led to an outpouring of heartfelt tributes from some of the profession's most prominent figures. A "brave and radical" trailblazer, and the first woman to win the Pritzker Prize, Hadid's significant impact on the world of architecture is undeniable. She will be missed.
"We are all shocked and devastated that we lost Zaha today, a most beautiful individual, talent, leader and friend," Patrik Schumacher, Director of Zaha Hadid Architects, wrote on Facebook.
We will continue to update this link as more tributes come in.
Zaha Hadid Dies Aged 65
The Iraqi-born British Architect Dame Zaha Hadid, DBE (1950-2016) has died aged 65, in Miami, Florida. According to reports from the BBC, Hadid was being treated in hospital for bronchitis when she suffered a heart attack. Earlier this year she became the first sole woman to receive the RIBA Royal Gold Medal at a ceremony in London.
Read on for the official statement from Zaha Hadid Architects:
Zaha Hadid Receives the RIBA Royal Gold Medal at a Ceremony in London
Congratulations to Dame Zaha Hadid who has tonight received the #RoyalGoldMedal for architecture.
Posted by RIBA on Wednesday, 3 February 2016
Zaha Hadid, who was named as the the first sole woman to be awarded the UK's highest honour for architects in her own right in 2015, received the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) 2016 Royal Gold Medal at a ceremony in London yesterday. Hadid, who was appointed a Dame of the British Empire in 2012, received the Pritzker Prize in 2004. Her practice also took both the 2010 and 2011 RIBA Stirling Prizes.
Zaha Hadid and Sou Fujimoto Among 30 to Design Pre-Fab Pavilions for Revolution Pre-Crafted
Following the recent trend of luxury pre-fabricated structures like Muji’s recent three huts, Robbie Antonio’s “Revolution Pre-Crafted” is a collection of pre-fabricated pavilions by 30 top designers and architects, including Zaha Hadid, Sou Fujimoto, Daniel Libeskind and Gluckman Tang. Some have already been built, being exhibited at Design Miami, while others are planned for the future.
With recent advancements in building technology, Revolution Pre-Crafted hopes to democratize the design of pre-fab structures, offering a line of products that incorporate the distinct spatial and social brands of the designers. See a selection of the Revolution Precraft line after the break.
Kengo Kuma Denies Copying Zaha Hadid's Tokyo National Stadium Design
In the latest Tokyo National Stadium news, Kengo Kuma is firing back to Zaha Hadid's allegations regarding the "similarities" of the two designs by insisting that his "concept is completely different." As reported the Architects' Journal, the Japanese architect agrees there are some natural similarities due to appropriate sightlines and regulations, however the actual design and concept are radically different.
"I believe that the design by Zaha Hadid was excellent, with a unique shape and demonstration of her philosophy," said Kuma in a press conference. "When we consider the design is being created within the same land, using the same tracks and under the same laws it is natural and almost automatic that there are some similarities which will arise."
"And despite the technical details being similar, the concepts and designs are completely different," he added, referring to Hadid's "saddle-style" design and his flat-roofed proposal.
JSC Witholds Payment from Zaha Hadid in Exchange for Copyright Release
Zaha Hadid is facing new hurdles regarding her scrapped Tokyo National Stadium design; according to the architect, the Japan Sport Council (JSC) is withholding an overdue payment until ZHA agrees to relinquish ownership of their original designs.
After working on the design for more than two years, the British practice was decommissioned from the project over cost objections last summer. Since, Japanese architect Kengo Kuma has been reassigned the project, offering a design that ZHA says is suspiciously similar to their original proposal "in the structure, layout and numerous elements."
Now, the JSC has requested ZHA agrees to new "Compliance Rules" that would allow the stadium's new architect to "use any product of work ... regardless of its copyright."
Can Anyone Win in Architecture Criticism? An Appeal for a "New Sincerity"
In the mid-1980s, after literature had long been held hostage by postmodernist irony and cynicism, a new wave of authors called for an end to negativity, promoting a "new sincerity" for fiction. Gaining momentum into the 1990s, the movement reached a pinnacle in 1993 when, in his essay E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction, pop-culture seer David Foster Wallace, a proponent of this "new sincerity," made the following call to action: “The next real literary ‘rebels’ in this country might well emerge as some weird bunch of anti-rebels, born oglers who dare somehow to back away from ironic watching, who have the childish gall actually to endorse and instantiate single-entendre principles... These anti-rebels would be outdated, of course, before they even started. Dead on the page. Too sincere. Clearly repressed. Backward, quaint, naive, anachronistic. Maybe that’ll be the point. Maybe that’s why they’ll be the next real rebels. Real rebels, as far as I can see, risk disapproval. The old postmodern insurgents risked the gasp and squeal: shock, disgust, outrage, censorship, accusations of socialism, anarchism, nihilism. Today’s risks are different. The new rebels might be artists willing to risk the yawn, the rolled eyes, the cool smile, the nudged ribs, the parody of gifted ironists, the ‘Oh how banal.'"
Architecture, ever in debt to the styles and ideas of other art forms, could learn a thing or two now from the resuscitation of American fiction at the turn of the millennium. It too is enduring an identity crisis, mired by pessimism and uncertainty - a reality made painfully clear this past January when a New York Times Op-Ed by Steven Bingler and Martin C. Pedersen, How to Rebuild Architecture, divided camps and made the design world fume. In the editorial, the authors spoke vehemently of an architectural profession that has become mired by egos and been disconnected from public needs. Things quickly got ugly, critics wrestled with critics and subsequently the public got involved. What no one seemed to take into account is that this type of hounding is at the core of the problem. In its current landscape the discipline has struggled with its past, been deferential to its present, and wrestled with the uncertainty of its future. In a moment when we have become addicted to despondency, can anyone win?
A Parametric Devotion: Patrik Schumacher Discusses "Architecture and Freedom" at the Royal Academy
For its fall season of architecture events, the Royal Academy’s working theme is “Architecture and Freedom: a changing connection,” in a program conceived and organized by Architecture Programme Curator, Owen Hopkins. One of these events was a recent lecture by Patrik Schumacher, Director of Zaha Hadid Architects, and ardent promoter of Parametricism. In his lecture, what starts out with a brief exercise in damage control over the barrage of criticism recently endured by the firm, emerges as an impassioned discussion of architectural politics, design philosophies, and social imperatives.
Call for Submissions: Modern Art Museum in Lebanon
The Association for the Promotion and Exhibition of the Arts in Lebanon (APEAL) has launched a competition for the design of a new modern and contemporary art museum in Beirut, Lebanon. Architects of Lebanese origins based in Lebanon or globally are invited to submit entries for the yet-to-be-named museum, which is set to open in 2020.
Five Films to Watch at the 2015 Architecture Film Festival in Rotterdam
It's only logical that Rotterdam, one of Europe's leading cities for architecture and architectural practice, has a biennial film festival. Since its inception in 2000, the city's homage to architectural cinema now claims to be the biggest architectural film festival in the world. Featuring over one hundred international documentaries, feature films and shorts—as well as debates, lectures and seminars—this year's festival plans to "provide a podium for discussing the city and future of spatial development." From cinematic journeys into the world of the illusive Böhm family to Zaha Hadid, Chinese ghost cities to London's Barbican estate, this year's programme circles around the theme of the Global Home.
With the eighth incarnation of the Architecture Film Festival Rotterdam (AFFR) opening next week (running from the 7th - 11th October 2015), we've selected our five top picks from this year's schedule.
Gallery: A Sneak Peek at Zaha Hadid's Dominion Tower in Moscow
Photographer Laurian Ghinitoiu has shared with us this sneak peek of Zaha Hadid Architects' latest completed work, the Dominion Tower in Moscow. Led by Project Director Christos Passas, the building's eight rectilinear stories are each staggered and cantilevered over the one below and feature ribbon windows with a trademark Zaha Hadid twist, while the interior features a dramatic top-lit atrium criss-crossed by stairs. Read on to see Ghinitoiu's full photo set.
RIBA Awards 2016 Royal Gold Medal to Zaha Hadid
The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) have revealed that Dame Zaha Hadid will receive the 2016 Royal Gold Medal — the first sole woman to be awarded the UK's highest honour for architects in her own right. Previous female winners (Sheila O’Donnell in 2015, Patty Hopkins in 1994, and Ray Eames in 1979) were each recognised alongside their husbands and practice partners.
Given in recognition of a lifetime’s work, the RIBA Royal Gold Medal is approved personally by Her Majesty The Queen and is awarded to those who have had a significant influence "either directly or indirectly on the advancement of architecture." Other notable Royal Gold Medallists include Frank Gehry (2000), Lord Norman Foster, Baron of Thames Bank (1983), Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1959), Le Corbusier (1953), and Frank Lloyd Wright (1941). The medallists' names are engraved into the marble wall at the RIBA's headquarters in London.
Zaha Hadid Backs Down From Second Tokyo Olympic Stadium Bid
Just two weeks after the Japan Sport Council launched a second call for New National Stadium proposals, Zaha Hadid Architects and partner Nikken Sekkei have withdrawn from the competition. Although the duo promised to develop a "cost-effective" design that strictly adhered to the new competition's scaled down brief, they were unable to secure a contractor and therefore were forced to step down from the competition.
"It is disappointing that the two years of work and investment in the existing design for a new National Stadium for Japan cannot be further developed to meet the new brief through the new design competition," said ZHA in a press release.
Zaha Hadid: “Niemeyer Had an Innate Talent for Sensuality”
The first woman to receive the Pritzker Prize in 2004, Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid tells newspaper El País that she was fortunate as a child to have traveled with her parents and seen some of the world’s most impressive works of architecture and engineering feats.
Awed by the Mosque of Cordoba, Hadid says that the contrast between the darkness and the marble of the central church left a lasting impression, making this one of her favorite works to this day.
Zaha Hadid Architects Release Video Presentation and Report on New National Stadium in Tokyo
Update: On September 1st, the Japan Sport Council launched a new competition to find another design for Japan’s New National Stadium - this time for a design and build project with more stringent cost restrictions. Today, contractor Nikken Sekkei and Zaha Hadid Architects have confirmed that they will be re-entering the contest together, bringing forward work from their original design. “Our firm is certain that retaining the team of Design Supervisor and designers will deliver the best National Stadium, and we have invited Zaha Hadid Architects to join the design team” said Nikken Sekkei in a statement. “Applying this knowledge and experience of the project, this team can further develop the design to the new brief as a cost-effective proposal to realize the world’s best National Stadium.” The article below was originally published on August 26th.
In mid-July, Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe declared that ZHA's design for a New National stadium would not be completed and that plans for the Tokyo Olympics-Paralympics stadium would "start from zero." In response Zaha Hadid Architects has just issued a press release and a link to a 23-minute video presentation. The video, ZHA explains, "outline[s] in detail the unique design for the New National Stadium which has been developed over two years to be the most compact and efficient stadium for this very special location in Tokyo. Zaha Hadid Architects welcomes a new contractor bidding process for the New National Stadium to reduce costs and ensure value for money in terms of quality, durability and long-term sustainability."
Watch the video - or if you haven't got 23 minutes, read our synopsis - after the break.
Construction Begins on Zaha Hadid's One Thousand Museum in Miami
Following the ground breaking last December, construction has begun on Zaha Hadid’s One Thousand Museum in Miami, with 9,500 cubic yards of concrete already poured. Designed in association with the local architect of record, O’Donnell Dannwolf Partners Architects, the residential skyscraper will rise 62 stories, comprising half- and full-floor residences, duplex townhomes, and a single duplex penthouse, overlooking Museum Park and Biscayne Bay at 1000 Biscayne Boulevard. As a burgeoning area, Museum Park—once called Bicentennial Park—is home to the Peréz Art Museum Miami and will soon be home to the Frost Museum of Science.