The Zaha Hadid Foundation, in collaboration with the Architectural Association and Serpentine, will present 89 Degrees of Zaha Hadid, a 2-day Symposium celebrating Zaha Hadid’s life, work and enduring legacy.
The Zaha Hadid Foundation, in collaboration with the Architectural Association (AA) and Serpentine, will present 89 Degrees of Zaha Hadid, a 2-day Symposium celebrating Zaha Hadid’s life, work and enduring legacy. Marking the 10th anniversary year of her passing, the Symposium will take place on 30 and 31 October 2026. The latter date, 31 October, would have been Zaha’s 76th birthday.
More than 40 international speakers and panellists will participate in the Symposium, ranging from scholars and researchers to friends and colleagues of Zaha including Hélène Binet, Nigel Coates, Sir Peter Cook, Rolf Fehlbaum, Rem Koolhaas, Hayat Palumbo and Madelon Vriesendorp. It will explore the breadth of Zaha’s life and work, including her early life in the mid-20th-century milieu of Baghdad and Beirut; her years as a student and later teacher at the AA; the methods of architectural representation and research pioneered by Zaha and her team; the clients and collaborators who championed her ideas; her work across the many fields of design; and the making of her iconic persona, whose style and spirit were recognised far beyond the world of architecture.
The Symposium will be held across the three partner venues in London: The Zaha Hadid Foundation’s 10 Bowling Green Lane, Architectural Association (AA) and Serpentine. The first day, Friday 30 October (10am-6pm), will be hosted at the AA. On the second day, Saturday 31 October, events will take place at the Zaha Hadid Foundation (10am-4pm) and Serpentine (6-9pm). It will culminate with an event at Serpentine, featuring a cross-generational, interdisciplinary panel of practitioners reflecting on the past and future of Zaha’s legacy and her well-known mantra: “there should be no end to experimentation”.
89 Degrees of Zaha Hadid is a reference to Zaha’s 1983 painting, The World (89 Degrees). Created for Planetary Architecture Two (1983), Zaha’s first UK exhibition at the AA, it presents a compilation of her early projects mapped and floating across a skewed segment of an imagined Earth – a ‘Hadidland’ of fractured geometries, shifting perspectives and fluid horizons. The Symposium is a highlight of a series of commemorative events that will also see the public re-opening of the Zaha Hadid Foundation’s building at 10 Bowling Green Lane, formerly Zaha’s office, on 3 November 2026, following a refurbishment by Studio KA. The opening exhibition programme includes Zaha Hadid: Architecture of Performance, The Zaha Hadid Foundation, in collaboration with the Architectural Association (AA) and Serpentine, will present 89 Degrees of Zaha Hadid, a 2-day Symposium celebrating Zaha Hadid’s life, work and enduring legacy. Marking the 10th anniversary year of her passing, the Symposium will take place on 30 and 31 October 2026. The latter date, 31 October, would have been Zaha’s 76th birthday.
More than 40 international speakers and panellists will participate in the Symposium, ranging from scholars and researchers to friends and colleagues of Zaha including Hélène Binet, Nigel Coates, Sir Peter Cook, Rolf Fehlbaum, Rem Koolhaas, Hayat Palumbo and Madelon Vriesendorp. It will explore the breadth of Zaha’s life and work, including her early life in the mid-20th-century milieu of Baghdad and Beirut; her years as a student and later teacher at the AA; the methods of architectural representation and research pioneered by Zaha and her team; the clients and collaborators who championed her ideas; her work across the many fields of design; and the making of her iconic persona, whose style and spirit were recognised far beyond the world of architecture.
The Symposium will be held across the three partner venues in London: The Zaha Hadid Foundation’s 10 Bowling Green Lane, Architectural Association (AA) and Serpentine. The first day, Friday 30 October (10am-6pm), will be hosted at the AA. On the second day, Saturday 31 October, events will take place at the Zaha Hadid Foundation (10am-4pm) and Serpentine (6-9pm). It will culminate with an event at Serpentine, featuring a cross-generational, interdisciplinary panel of practitioners reflecting on the past and future of Zaha’s legacy and her well-known mantra: “there should be no end to experimentation”.
89 Degrees of Zaha Hadid is a reference to Zaha’s 1983 painting, The World (89 Degrees). Created for Planetary Architecture Two (1983), Zaha’s first UK exhibition at the AA, it presents a compilation of her early projects mapped and floating across a skewed segment of an imagined Earth – a ‘Hadidland’ of fractured geometries, shifting perspectives and fluid horizons. The Symposium is a highlight of a series of commemorative events that will also see the public re-opening of the Zaha Hadid Foundation’s building at 10 Bowling Green Lane, formerly Zaha’s office, on 3 November 2026, following a refurbishment by Studio KA. The opening exhibition programme includes Zaha Hadid: Architecture of Performance, exploring Zaha’s designs for theatre and performances ranging from her 1990 collaboration with Rosemary Butcher to her later sets for the Pet Shop Boys.
On view, The Rebar Beneath will be a newly commissioned, 11-minute dual-channel video work by multi-disciplinary artist LionHeart, rooted in his reflections on Zaha and the time he spent in the Foundation’s collection. A specially commissioned timeline visualisation of Zaha’s life, work and influence, The Completely Exhausting Inexhaustibility of Zaha Hadid by Pulitzer Prize-winning illustrator Mona Chalabi will also be unveiled.
Zaha had close ties with both the AA and Serpentine. She studied at the AA from 1972 to 1977, winning its prestigious Diploma Prize in the latter year, and continued to teach there until 1987. At Serpentine, where she served as a Trustee from 1996 until her death in 2016, Zaha designed the inaugural Serpentine Pavilion in 2000 and was also the architect of the permanent extension of the Serpentine North Gallery (2009-2013).
“In the 10th anniversary year of her death, we want to celebrate Zaha’s life – a figure who transformed architecture and design, and the spatial and formal possibilities of the world we inhabit,” said Aric Chen, Director of the Zaha Hadid Foundation. “We hope this symposium will shed further light on the profoundness with which she did so.”
“Zaha Hadid’s forceful legacy continues to resound at the AA. Her perspective on the world, in all its dynamism, ambiguity and unfathomable complexity, continues to catalyse new ideas at our school, and she has had an immeasurable impact on how young people understand the limitlessness of their own architectural ambition,” said Ingrid Schroder, Director of the AA. “This Symposium offers a timely chance both to celebrate Zaha’s legacy and to look beyond the mythology of her image towards what the work continues to teach us.”
Bettina Korek, CEO, and Hans Ulrich Obrist, Artistic Director, Serpentine said: “Zaha Hadid’s belief that there ‘should be no end to experimentation’ continues to inspire our work at Serpentine. Our longstanding friendship with Zaha is woven into Serpentine’s history and continues to shape our programme today. We honour Zaha’s extraordinary legacy while remaining committed to the spirit of innovation and the possibilities of new ideas.”
The Symposium has been curated by Aric Chen, Jihane Dyer, Francesco Fiammenghi (Zaha Hadid Foundation), Shumon Basar (Architectural Association) and Hans Ulrich Obrist (Serpentine).
Participant List
George Arbid, Saffet Kaya Bekiroğlu, Hélène Binet, Nicholas Boyarsky, Nigel Coates, Sir Peter Cook, Domitilla Dardi, Oliver Domeisen, Frida Escobedo, Rolf Fehlbaum, Masoud Golsorkhi, David Gomersall, Catherine Howe, Eva Jiřičná, Zina Kafilmout Allos, Lisette Khalastchi, Shaikha Mai bint Mohammed Al Khalifa, Rem Koolhaas, CJ Lim, Desley Luscombe, Mya Manakides, Rowan Moore, Paolo Moroni, Lady Hayat Palumbo, Eugene Rogan, Marco Sammicheli, William Sawaya, Ingrid Schroder, Brian Ma Siy, Davide Spina, Brett Steele, Deyan Sudjic, Sumayya Vally, Margarita Valova, Francesco Vezzoli, Madelon Vriesendorp, Peter Wilson and Philip Michael Wolfson.
89 Degrees of Zaha Hadid
Friday 30 October 2026
10am-6pm
Architectural Association
36 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3ES
Saturday 31 October 2026
10am-4pm
Zaha Hadid Foundation
10 Bowling Green Lane, London, EC1R 0BQ
6-9pm
Serpentine North
West Carriage Drive, London, W2 2AR
About the Zaha Hadid Foundation
Founded by Zaha Hadid, the Zaha Hadid Foundation is an independent charity dedicated to the legacy of the boundary breaking architect and her commitment to education and perpetual experimentation across architecture and related disciplines.
The Foundation maintains, researches and activates Zaha’s extensive archive while actively contributing to architectural culture today. In addition to supporting education, emerging voices and partnering with a range of organisations around the world, the Foundation hosts exhibitions and public programmes at 10 Bowling Green Lane — Zaha’s former office— in London.
