About Me
Businessman Farhad Hakimzadeh, together with other Iranian
expatriates in the United Kingdom, established in 1995 the Iran Heritage
Foundation, a non-political entity charged with providing knowledge
about the positive contributions of Persian languages, culture, and
history. The impetus for the Foundation’s creation was to challenge
negative stereotypes arising from the tensions between the Islamic
Republic of Iran and Western nations. Farhad Hakimzadeh accepted the
position of Chief Executive Officer of the Iran Heritage Foundation,
serving for over 11 years in this capacity.
During his tenure as Foundation head, Farhad Hakimzadeh positioned
the organization as a major resource of support for academic research,
art exhibits, publications, conferences and seminars, lectures, and
performing arts. He had oversight for awarding postdoctoral research and
teaching scholarships at institutions such as Oxford University and the
British Museum. He fostered relationships with art museums around the
world to tour Persian art exhibits, like “Royal Persian Paintings, The
Qajar Epoch, 1785-1925,” produced by New York’s Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Collaborating with the University of Arkansas Press, he facilitated the
publication of Let Me Tell You Where I’ve Been: New Writing by Women of
the Iranian Diaspora. He coordinated sponsorship of conferences,
including “Iran and the Emerging Global Order,” held at and organized by
Coventry University. With a wide spectrum of lectures on Iranian
topics, he selected ones like “The Persian Garden,” held at the Royal
Geographic Society. Farhad Hakimzadeh also commissioned performing arts
projects, such as “Death by Heroine: An Anglo-Iranian play,” produced at
London’s Riverside Studios.
Farhad Hakimzadeh, born in 1948, is the son of a Tehran
industrialist and his wife. The majority of his schooling as a youth was
in Germany, and he later chose to pursue university training in the
United States, earning his BS at MIT and an MBA at Harvard. He became a
U.S. citizen after the Iranian Revolution, working as a successful real
estate developer and venture capitalist. He moved to London in the
mid-1990s to oversee the care of his aging parents.
Interests
Philanthropy, Networking, Fundraising
