ZHA after Zaha Hadid: Interview With Patrik Schumacher
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The 20th century produced a large number of legendary architects. Yet there was only one woman among them: the Iraqi-born Zaha Hadid, winner of the 2004 Pritzker Architecture Prize, who revolutionized her profession (and the role of women within it) before heZHA after Zaha Hadid: Interview With Patrik Schumacher
The 20th century produced a large number of legendary architects. Yet there was only one woman among them: the Iraqi-born Zaha Hadid, winner of the 2004 Pritzker Architecture Prize, who revolutionized her profession (and the role of women within it) before her untimely death in March 2016. Today, the firm that bears her name is steered by her longtime architectural partner, Patrik Schumacher, who oversees a staff of 400 people in multiple cities around the world.At the time of Hadid’s passing, questions were raised about the long-term viability of the firm. Two and a half years on, Zaha Hadid Architects seems to have survived without the woman whose name is on the door. ZHA is busy completing the many projects secured in her lifetime — the 520 West 28th Street tower in New York, for example, whose new residents include Sting and Ariana Grande; or the $1.1 billion, 780-room Morpheus Hotel in Macau. The firm is also clinching big new jobs, including a tower in Hong Kong on the world’s priciest patch of real estate, and the Navi Mumbai International Airport.On a recent afternoon, Schumacher — a pioneer of parametricism, a style of architecture that’s rooted in computer technology and algorithms — discussed his firm’s past and future with BLOUINSHOP. The interview took place at the Building Centre in London, beside a display of futuristic designs by Schumacher and his research team: housing units developed using algorithmic techniques, and foam sculptures generated by robotic hot-wire cutting technology.Do you find it difficult to be a successor to this incredible woman, with whom you worked so closely with for so many years?I think I’m catching up. The way Zaha’s reputation was made was through the internal adulation and mechanisms of selection in the profession. The profession selects its stars through awards, lectures at major universities, and conferences, keynote speeches. That is then lifted up into the mainstream and into general recognition.I’m at the stage where, internal to the field, I’m very prominent. I give 60 lectures within 12 months, keynote speeches. That will translate eventually, particularly through the media. I’m doing my best, and I hope the credibility will come through, because I have my own originality and creativity and standing in the field.We live in a world that loves stars and celebrities. The name on your firm is still the name of a superstar who has unfortunately left us.Even with her around, we had to convince clients through the design. Maybe the name gets you into the first shortlist, but then what counts is what you’re giving them. Do they trust that you can deliver? Is it beautiful, is it rational?That’s my experience.Have you ever felt tempted to go off and start your own firm, to put your own name on the wall?Sure. [He laughs.] But the collaboration with Zaha was too good. At the moment, we’re running well under the current brand. Maybe later, we will think that Zaha hasn’t been there for a long while, and perhaps it’s time for a rebrand.I sometimes thought of [going it alone], but my ego wasn’t so large that being totally independent would have been worth cutting myself off. I was very happy with that collaboration. I knew that on the media side of things, I would always be nearly invisible. But in the firm, in the field, with colleagues, I always projected my persona around the world.How is business for you in Europe and the Middle East? Europe is pretty lame — ever since the European debt crisis and the meltdown. In the Middle East, there’s tension with Qatar, where our football stadium is being built, and we have other projects which get hampered and delayed by the tension with the UAE and Saudi Arabia. But Dubai is moving, and Saudi Arabia is flourishing with the new crown prince and the reforms. We’re doing a metro station there, we’ve finished Kapsarc [the King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and Research Center], and there’s a museum coming outside Riyadh. And in North Africa, we’re doing an opera house in Rabat.What about London?London is booming to some extent, but it’s very difficult to penetrate the market here. We finally got one major job, which is Vauxhall Cross — a twin-tower, mixed-use scheme right opposite the Parliament. The developer is Saudi, coming from the outside. In London, it’s very much about trusted hands, and we just have to break through once.The Chinese are also coming here. We have more of a chance with a Chinese or Saudi developer than with a London developer — although we’ve met with all of them, and I’ve introduced myself. To land something here, it takes a long time.You recently secured two mega-projects in India and Hong Kong. Can you talk about business in Asia?Asia is the real engine. The amount of projects we have in China — we can’t even deal with the requests. We’re very hot there. They love our designs, they love our urbanism. We have master plans, various buildings. The projects sometimes come by the square kilometer, by the millions of square meters, rather than the tens or hundreds of thousands. So we have a Beijing office which is growing, with 25 people. We have 10 people in Hong Kong. We could do much more.We’re actually on a growth trajectory, where we have to find staff for all our ventures. And that’s a big challenge for us here. The immigration policy in the U.K. is so restrictive that the few Europeans who are still around are snapped up. We also need people from Asia. We need junior staff. But there’s no way at the moment that they can get a visa.Broadly speaking, how do you see architecture evolving in the next 10 years?I believe in urban concentration. You can call it the urban renaissance. You still see villages and small towns emptying out in the cities around the world, including in Germany and Europe and Asia. So we need to gear up to that.I’m getting more and more interested in urban issues and in densification. Mixed-use residences. Ideas like co-living, new concepts. People don’t need these large apartments anymore. They don’t need the garages anymore if it’s all Uber or self-driving. If you have your library on your Kindle and your record collection on your iPhone, and you’re traveling more, it’s no use having a huge apartment.You and your firm are world leaders of computerized architectural design. You are creating computational systems whereby you have architects in four different cities co-designing remotely and simultaneously. As the world becomes more computerized, and artificial intelligence increasingly takes over, doesn’t that put you in a key position?Absolutely. Now we are starting to use AI systems more and more to finetune designs. We have optimized computation design, and we’re moving into digital fabrication. In the end, you have something which will be cheaper materially, and space-saving. I believe that this new way of working will become more generalized. As this becomes more understood, our workload and our attractiveness will soar.This interview appears in the September issue of Modern Painters and BlouinShop.http://www.blouinartinfo.com/Founder: Louise Blouin Read more