Highest paid director enjoys nine-fold pay rise

The parent of Zaha Hadid Architects has revealed a jump in pre-tax profit with the highest-paid director enjoying a nine-fold increase in their pay.

The practice’s parent company Zaha Hadid Holdings filed its latest accounts at Companies House this week with the firm seeing pre-tax profit rise 21% to £4.8m on turnover flat at £46.5m for the year to April 2018.

The accounts, which were signed off by Charlotte Philipps, who was appointed to the board last year, also show that highest-paid director, who is not named, picked up just over £819,000 – compared to 87,705 in 2017.

The firm added: “Competition in the UK for architectural contracts is currently very challenging but our global customer spread has mitigated the effect of this on our business.â€

Among the overseas schemes the firm is working on include a residential building called the Bora Tower in Mexico City, while it is working on a new airport at Mumbai, India, while it is working on a masterplan for old port in Estonia’s capital, Tallinn.

Last November, the firm hit the headlines when the late architect’s long-time business partner Patrik Schumacher lodged a claim in the High Court against his three fellow executors of Hadid’s £70m will. The three are architectural patron Peter Palumbo, Hadid’s niece Rana and the artist Brian Clarke.