Divergence from the Small Scale. Zaha Hadid 59 Eaton Place

Abstract

Reviewing the treatises on the history of architecture from the end of the 20th century, we can observe an evident absence of those small-scale projects carried out in that period. It seems that not having responded to the great size or bigness, defended by what was perhaps its most in"uential architect, Rem Koolhaas, who was becoming more and more present in those years with the support of the neoliberal economic model in developed countries, excluded them to leave them out of the o#cial story. However, some of these small works, which we can call examples of smallness, meant a break with the dominant large formats, de!ning new ways of projecting through giving voice to those emerging trends. Among these small projects we !nd the design carried out by the architect Zaha Hadid in Eaton Place, Belgravia, London between 1980 and 1981, which stands out for its questioning of the hegemonic typological and compositional arrangements still inherited from the modern movement in the United Kingdom at the beginning of the 1980s. Made by Hadid a few years after graduating from the Architectural Association, this project brings together those elements of her !rst graphic experiments that questioned the restrictions of drawing as a method of communication to be used as a project and work process that marked a di$erence against the dominant postmodern current to turn them into an architectural project for the !rst time. To understand its importance, this article will investigate the bases that defended this project through a review of both those works carried out by Hadid in her last years as a student at the Architectural Association between 1972 and 1977, which explore the relationship between drawing and project, as well as her collaborations and !rst proposals as an architect between 1977 and 1981 that investigate spatial de!nition through geometries that "oat and gravitate between spatial concreteness and the ambiguity of experience. Finally, the article makes a more speci!c analysis of the aspects that de!ne this project and its subsequent impact that de!ne it as an example to highlight in this alternative history that includes the small.