Architect Zaha Hadid was born on October 31, 1950, in Baghdad, Iraq. She currently lives and works in London. After studying mathematics at the American University of Beirut, she moved to the UK with her family in 1972. She studied architecture at the Architectural Association College of Architecture in London, graduating in 1977. She then worked under Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas before going independent in 1980. In 1983, she won first place in an architectural design competition, recommended by architect Arata Isozaki. Despite the design being impossible to realize, this work brought her instant fame. She taught at Harvard University and the University of Illinois in the 1980s, but for over a decade, she was known as a "deconstructivist architect." Her first completed project was the Vitra Fire Station in Germany in 1993.

Other designs include London's Aquatics Centre, built for the 2010 Olympics, the National Museum of 21st Century Arts (MAXXI) in Rome, and the Guangzhou Opera House in China. To date, the only project she has worked on in Japan is the Neil Barrett Aoyama store. It won the top prize in the competition for the new National Stadium, which is aiming for completion in 2019 in time for the Tokyo Olympics.

In the fashion industry, STUART WEITZMAN in Milan, which she designed, opened in September this year. A collaborative shoe line with UNITED NUDE is also scheduled to be released in November.