The late Zaha Hadid’s work might have long been a source of astonishment, for its sci-fi forms and gravity-defying structural feats, but now she’s gone, her practice is prompting incredulity for a very different reason. The queen of the curve has been supplanted by the king of free-market libertarianism, director of Zaha Hadid Architects Patrik Schumacher.
Schumacher – who worked alongside Hadid from 1988 and now heads her practice – has railed against everything from state-funded art schools (“an indefensible anachronism”) to the “PC takeover” of architecture. Both opponents and supporters declaring him to be “the Trump of architecture”.
Raging against the “social engineering” of housing design guides and the “intellectually bankrupt” idea of land use plans, Patrik Schumacher set out his Urban Policy Manifesto, which rambled from scrapping housing space standards to abolishing all forms of rent control and tenancy regulation.
Never politically outspoken, Zaha Hadid was happy to work for regimes of all different shades. But did she share Schumacher’s extreme views?
When Schumacher joined the firm in the 1980s, the two were closer politically. Like a number of fellow rightwing libertarians, Schumacher was a former Marxist who had become disillusioned. He was finally jolted out of his “mainstream political slumber” by the 2008 financial crisis, when he discovered the writings of Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek, the godfathers of neoliberalism, along with Murray Rothbard’s ideas of anarcho-capitalism.
Schumacher has faith in the power of the pure unbridled market to solve everything, from housing provision to employment regulation, imagining a world where privatisation is extended to streets, city management and possibly even legal systems.
He is full of praise for Airbnb, the “productivity engine” of Google and the potentials of blockchain, identifying with the free-spirited Silicon Valley mindset, the “post-hippy milieu”, for which he thinks his fluid, networked conception of architecture is the true representative style.
He is currently excited by the idea of “free private cities”, cites the privately run Indian city of Gurgaon as a promising example. “Equality is an aspiration,” says Mr. Scumacher, “but it should not be a priority over economic progress.”
Source: Zaha Hadid's successor: scrap art schools, privatise cities and bin social housing
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| Patrik Schumacher on his throne |
Schumacher – who worked alongside Hadid from 1988 and now heads her practice – has railed against everything from state-funded art schools (“an indefensible anachronism”) to the “PC takeover” of architecture. Both opponents and supporters declaring him to be “the Trump of architecture”.
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| Zaha Hadid and Patrik Schumacher in 2011 |
Raging against the “social engineering” of housing design guides and the “intellectually bankrupt” idea of land use plans, Patrik Schumacher set out his Urban Policy Manifesto, which rambled from scrapping housing space standards to abolishing all forms of rent control and tenancy regulation.
Never politically outspoken, Zaha Hadid was happy to work for regimes of all different shades. But did she share Schumacher’s extreme views?
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| The Heydar Aliyev Centre in Baku, Azerbaijan, which won the Design Museum’s award for Schumacher and Hadid in 2014 |
When Schumacher joined the firm in the 1980s, the two were closer politically. Like a number of fellow rightwing libertarians, Schumacher was a former Marxist who had become disillusioned. He was finally jolted out of his “mainstream political slumber” by the 2008 financial crisis, when he discovered the writings of Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek, the godfathers of neoliberalism, along with Murray Rothbard’s ideas of anarcho-capitalism.
Schumacher has faith in the power of the pure unbridled market to solve everything, from housing provision to employment regulation, imagining a world where privatisation is extended to streets, city management and possibly even legal systems.
He is full of praise for Airbnb, the “productivity engine” of Google and the potentials of blockchain, identifying with the free-spirited Silicon Valley mindset, the “post-hippy milieu”, for which he thinks his fluid, networked conception of architecture is the true representative style.
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| India's first fully privately funded Rapid Metro Gurgaon running on track after starting its commercial operations |
He is currently excited by the idea of “free private cities”, cites the privately run Indian city of Gurgaon as a promising example. “Equality is an aspiration,” says Mr. Scumacher, “but it should not be a priority over economic progress.”
Source: Zaha Hadid's successor: scrap art schools, privatise cities and bin social housing
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