Dezeen Magazine

Google Doodle remembers Zaha Hadid's 2004 Pritzker Prize win

Today's Google Doodle celebrates late architect Zaha Hadid, who became the first woman to be awarded the Pritzker Prize for architecture 13 years ago today.

Displayed on the search engine's homepage in more than 20 countries, the illustration shows the Iraqi-born British architect standing in front of her studio's design for the Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku, Azerbaijan.

The cultural venue was named Design of the Year by London's Design Museum in 2014.

Inspired by historic Islamic designs found in calligraphy and geometric patterns, the building is distinguished by its swooping roof structure made from panels of glass-fibre-reinforced concrete.

"This was an incredibly ambitious project and for me," said Hadid in 2014, speaking at the Designs of the Year award ceremony. "It was always my dream to design and build the theoretical project and that was the closet thing to achieving that."

Three sketches reveal the concept for the Google Doodle, which features Zaha Hadid and her Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku, Azerbaijan

Hadid is one of the most successful female architects in history. Her work broke new ground on modern architecture using the surrounding landscape for building inspiration.

Google said of the Doodle: "Before computers made her designs easier to put on paper, Hadid's studio was known to use the photocopier in creative ways to bend lines and create new shapes. The type in today's Doodle finds inspiration in Hadid's energetic sketches, which explored both form and function."

In the customised logo, Hadid wears a voluminous black coat similar to the ones she was often photographed wearing. Her love of statement garments by designers such as Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garçons, Miuccia Prada, Elke Walter, Issey Miyake was well documented.

In 2013 her London gallery space hosted a show of work by fashion designer Elke Walter and in 2014 she designed and provided a set of outfits for the Women Fashion Power exhibition at London's Design Museum.

The completed Google Doodle is appearing on the search engine in more than 20 countries

Hadid, who was also the first woman awarded the Royal Gold Medal by the Royal Institute of British Architects, has always been one of the most talked-about and searched-for figures among Dezeen readers. Ranking at number one on the Dezeen hotlist, posts about her, and her studio Zaha Hadid Architects, are regularly among the most popular on our site.

Her death on 31 March 2016 led to a huge desire among our audience to both read the tributes to her death from fellow architects and to revisit her past projects. Our story about her passing was one of the most visited, and commented, posts of the past year.

The animation is the latest in a series of Google Doodles that pay tribute to famous architects.

In 2014, Google honoured what would have been the 382nd birthday of Christopher Wren, and in 2013, Google Japan honoured the 100th birthday of Kenzo Tange, while in 2012 the company marked the 126th birthday of Mies van der Rohe.