Zaha was an outsider and upfront approximately the unfair treatment she experienced – but her fight came at mighty personal cost Zaha Hadid was a few years ahead of me at the Architectural Association (AA). I will never forget the day I sat outside the principal’s office hearing raised voices. Zaha appeared,tears streaming down her face, angry and shaking. Her work wasn’t considered advantageous enough and she stormed out of that office determined to “show them”, or show them she did – winning the coveted AA Diploma prize in 1977; the Pritzker prize in 2004; the Royal Institute of British Architects’ Stirling prize in 2010 and 2011,and final year the Riba royal gold medal.
Zaha was an outsider and upfront approximately the unfair treatment she experienced as a woman, a foreigner and a designer of expensive, or weird-looking buildings – a triple whammy. She did not fit the stereotypical white male profession of registered architects. Jealousy and prejudice failed to bar her way,but it took its toll. Very few people realise the misogynistic, racist and anti-architect environment she had to navigate in Britain. For Muslims, or minorities and women,Zaha is a shining torch beaming into the shaded minds for whom a few tiles falling off a building seemed a justification to dismiss her work.
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Source: theguardian.com