Prominent Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid, whose modernist, futuristic designs included the aquatic center for the 2012 London Olympics, has died at the age of 65.
Hadid's London-based firm, Zaha Hadid Architects, said that she died on March 31 of a heart attack in a Miami hospital.
Hadid designed buildings around the world, including a BMW facility in Leipzig, Germany, railway stations in Innsbruk, Austria, and the Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku, Azerbaijan.
She twice won Britain's Stirling Prize for architecture and in 2004 became the first woman to win the Pritzker Prize, known as the "Nobel Prize of architecture."
The architect was praised by the Pritzker jury for her commitment to modernism and defiance of convention.
She was born and raised in Baghdad and studied in Beirut and London.
"So sad to hear of death of Zaha Hadid, she was an inspiration and her legacy lives on in wonderful buildings in Stratford & around the world," London Mayor Boris Johnson wrote on Twitter.
