Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid, whose fluid, futuristic designs were used in buildings across the world to widespread acclaim, has died of a heart attack at the age of 65, her company said on Thursday. Hadid's projects included the MAXXI museum in Rome, the London Aquatics Centre used in the 2012 Summer Olympics, the Heydar Aliyev Centre in Baku, Azerbaijan, and the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum in Michigan, which was featured in the recently released Batman vs Superman. "She had contracted bronchitis earlier this week and suffered a sudden heart attack while being treated in hospital," said Zaha Hadid Architects.

Born in Baghdad, she went to boarding schools in England and Switzerland before studying mathematics at the American University of Beirut. She turned to architecture in London in the 1970s, establishing her own practice in 1979.

"Architects are crazy. We do all-nighters, we used to do five nights, no sleep," she told BBC radio last month. "You are very exhausted, so there's a bit of delirium that sets in."

Few of her geometrically complex designs in the 1980s and 1990s were realised, but she refused to compromise.

Her company's design was chosen for the 2020 Tokyo summer Olympic stadium but was scrapped due to ballooning costs. Critics had derided it as reminiscent of a bicycle helmet or drooping oyster and out of sync with the neighborhood.

"It's very important in the main idea nothing gets diluted," she said of a factory she designed for BMW in Leipzig, Germany.