architecture: Norman Foster on-screen and in Toronto

I saw Woody Allen's woefully underwritten Match Point and one of the characters works in "Norman's gherkin", the fabulous Swiss Re building. The movie's exterior shots obscure the building's seductive rounded bottom, so it looks like an obscenely phallic symbol on the skyline. But I've walked around it and it's so beautiful in its seamless idea->design->execution that it's unreal. The movie's interior shots show conventional rectangular offices walled off from the curving exterior, which if true is a shame.

I just learned from Wikipedia that stormin' Norman also designed a relatively modest University building that I enjoyed in Toronto. He's reliably fine and usually great.

Categories: architecture, NormanFoster