Zaha Hadid
Zaha Hadid
Dame Zaha Mohammad Hadid, DBEwas an Iraqi-born British architect. She was the first Arab woman who received the Pritzker Architecture Prize, winning it in 2004. She received the Stirling Prize in 2010 and 2011. In 2012, she was created a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire and in 2015 she became the first woman to be awarded the RIBA Gold Medal in her own right...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionArchitect
Date of Birth31 October 1950
CityBaghdad, Iraq
office focus used
I can't focus when there's too many things around. Whenever I used to go to the office, I used to always say, 'Tidy up.'
father party leader
My father was a politician, and a very important politician, and one of the leaders of the Iraqi Democratic Party, who believed in progress.
adventure avant-garde spirit
The spirit of adventure to embrace the new and the incredible belief in the power of invention attracted me to the Russian avant-garde.
cities exciting toughness
I find industrial cities exciting. I like their toughness.
half female students
Half of architecture students are women, and you see respected, established female architects all the time.
london exciting
I loved London. In the 1970s... it was very exciting, really wild.
space people connections
Obviously for some people there is a big connection between music and the way you can create a space.
very-good skyscraper i-can
I am sure that as a woman I can do a very good skyscraper.
looks architecture architect
It's not my duty as an architect to look at it
fashion kids london
I have been interested in fashion since I was a kid. Then I lived in London, where it was more about costume and a personal statement of who you are than about fashion.
country hip-hop hips
I like music. Country, hip-hop, R&B, sometimes classical.
people
I don't think I am that tough, actually. Well, tough in the sense that I don't take any rubbish, and that doesn't make me very popular, frankly. I mean, because some people say something to me, and I just tell them off. I mean, why should I put up with it?
allowed future reinvent
It's very important that historic cities are allowed to reinvent their future.
ahead architects based happen ten time
I think that the training of architects allows you to see what will happen ten years ahead of time, or twenty. It's not guessing, it's not intuitive, it's based on research - and we may be wrong.