Zaha Hadid, architect famed for futuristic curved works, dies

Zaha Hadid, the world's most famous female architect who attracted plaudits for works of sweeping curves and controversy for huge cost overruns, died on March 31 at the age of 65.

The Iraqi-British architect Hadid, the first woman to win the prestigious Pritzker Prize for architecture, was best known for her designs for the Guangzhou Opera House in China and the aquatics center used in the 2012 London Olympics.

But she faced criticism last year after her futuristic $2 billion design for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic stadium was scrapped amid spiraling costs and complaints over the design.

Born in Baghdad in 1950, where her father was a politician, Hadid forged a career in the male-dominated world of architecture bringing her curvaceous, radical designs to life in glass, steel and concrete.

"It is with great sadness that Zaha Hadid Architects have confirmed that Dame Zaha Hadid died suddenly in Miami in the early hours of this morning," her firm said in a statement, adding that she had suffered a heart attack after contracting bronchitis this week.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi paid tribute to Hadid, describing her death as a loss for the "whole world." 

She "served the world through her creativity, and in losing her, the whole world has lost one of the great energies that served the community," Abadi said in a statement.

Hadid's other notable works included the Italian National Museum of 21st Century Arts in Rome, the Heydar Aliyev Centre in Baku and the Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art in Cincinnati.

"I believe that the complexities and dynamism of contemporary life cannot be cast into the simple platonic forms provided by the classical canon," she said in her speech accepting the Pritzker...