Zaha Hadid Facts: "The Queen of Curves"
Zaha Hadid Biography in short
Zaha Hadid Facts: Starting Designing Small Projects in the early years
Well-surnamed "The Queen of Curves”, one of the most popular Zaha Hadid facts was to transform the skylines of cities around the world with her bold, fluid, and free-line designs. (See Fig. 1 below)
The extraordinarily dynamic paintings that she used to convey the essence of the design commanded worldwide attention and continue to shape Hadid’s thinking today.
Zaha Hadid facts: She began designing small projects in 1973 after graduating from Baghdad University. She moved to London in 1975 and started working as a freelance designer.
One of the Most Architecture Influencers in the World
As an Architect, and a Lebanese as well, I authorize myself to say that I’m proud of this person and admire her various projects at the same time. Before, when I was a student at the college of architecture, I always heard her name repeated by our instructors as a role model and top influencer in the architecture industry to follow. I meant by following, not to copy but to be inspired by her strategy and philosophy which was her road to success.
➤ Read more: You can read the article at the following link: Zaha Hadid and Patrick Schumacher’s Philosophy. I may like to make a lot of researches concerning her projects and reviews about it; not to comment or critic but to highlight her magnificent concepts and make it public to all the world to see and benefit for her theories in Arts in general.
She was working on a series of projects that will serve as defining landmarks in such disparate settings as Dubai, Rome, and Guangzhou, China. She did realize as well some small-scale projects such as a pavilion for the Maggie’s Centre cancer care movement on a hospital campus in Kirkcaldy, Scotland.
Zaha Hadid facts: (ZHA) Projects
When Hadid arrived in London as a student in the 1970s, the recession was at its higher levels; all the professions were experiencing a lack of work and loss of confidence, especially the architects due to a hidden conflict that then come to light.The modernism of the 30s, led by Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe, the famous Architects, was inhaling his last breath: The idealism of the 60s was taking its place. So, in consequence, The Architectural Association, where Hadid studied from 1972 to 1977, leads a sort of discussion to find an alternative to the modernism of the ’30s; e.g. providing new directions in design.
Alvin Boyarsky, a Russian Architect, comes to the head of the Architectural Association and was leading the campaign which attracted mostly radical thinkers and practitioners of every ideological persuasion.
The school provided an environment in which Hadid could explore one of the twentieth century’s great art movements, Russian Constructivism.
This revolutionary period was the point of departure for her breakthrough project – the winning design for The Peak – an apartment complex and club overlooking the city of Hong Kong.
The design rejected the current architectural style of Post-Modernism that applied decorative classical columns and cosmetic stone claddings to every new project.
Although never built, the extraordinarily dynamic paintings that she used to convey the essence of the design commanded worldwide attention and continue to shape Hadid’s thinking today. But even though her early projects or conceptions were never been executed in reality, this didn’t stop her flow of design energy to merge on top of the new vision to modernize Architecture if we can say.
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The Cardiff Bay Opera House- Credit: Wikipedia.org |
One of the further Zaha Hadid facts: It was clear that she was believing in the idea of architecture as a speculative, theoretical activity in which design drawings were as important as construction, even more maybe. The delay between conceiving the designs that made her reputation, and building them, made it inevitable that Hadid would be represented as being more concerned with theory than practice.
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Fig. 2- The Phaeno Science Center, Credit to Wikipedia.org |
These schemes, however, allowed her to develop ideas and working methods that would form the basis of new work. After the Vitra Fire Station was completed in 1993, Hadid built very little until the major projects of the last three years.
Another of the Zaha Hadid facts: The Phaeno Science Center (fig.2 above), the BMW Central Building (fig.3 below), and the Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art (fig.4 below) were taken together, thing that came to prove the theory that Hadid is primarily a theorist rather than a builder. Each of those projects has a strong material quality and demonstrates her ability to translate the dynamic warping and disruption of space evident and very strong in her drawings into physical reality.
In these projects, the jagged edges of the linear spaces of her earlier work have melted into more voluptuous forms and shapes.
Hadid has the visibility that attracted projects and clients from all over the world, which is proof of her internationality and her humanity's belongings.
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Fig.4- The Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art- Credit: flickr.com |
She continues to explore fresh shapes and new thinking, making the transition from the world of theory and research to large-scale practice.