Top of the world

Have you been to the top of the Gherkin? Neither had I until last week. It's incredible. It's a building that I, like many of us, had long admired from afar but I was not prepared for just how magical it is inside. It provides an insight into how our ancestors must have felt visiting the temples and cathedrals that were the wonders of their age. 

The thing is, builders of truly incredible buildings have often tried to impress by creating a structure that appears to be impossible. Alongside admiring the grace and beauty of their creation, they want us to be astonished that it was possible to build at all. Unfortunately for us, the advent of computer aided design (combined with the impact of computing on structural engineering) means that once-imposssible buildings are now commonplace. As a result, we don't get the sense of awe that visitors to the Pantheon in Rome, the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul or even our very own St Paul's will have felt. Funny-shaped buildings are everywhere, and we now know that anything's possible.

However, the Gherkin is different. The top floor is suspended within the glazed dome formed by the top of the structure. That wonderful pattern of triangular glazing rises up around you, and then meets in the middle. The mezzanine-style top storey simply hangs there, enveloped in sky, with the dome floating above. As with all great buildings, the Gherkin is built on a very human scale. The fact that each small triangle is subtly different keeps the eye engaged and moving and keeps the building human. Standing in the sky, your eye dances around the constantly repeating, constantly changing pattern of the glazing towards the clouds beyond and you find yourself asking, like our forefathers, how on earth it's possible.

As you can tell, I was somewhat overawed.

As a result, I couldn't go straight back to work afterwards, so I popped into St Boltoph without Bishopsgate, one of the non-Wren City churches that I've never visited before.

It had a gentle peace and solidity that was the exact opposite of the beautiful, but very urban, Gherkin.

There were three people already there when I walked in. One was an Asian man. He was young and wearing headphones. He looked relaxed, and just sat in his pew listening to music. I wonder why he'd chosen a church to hang out in. On the opposite side of the chuch, sat a black woman. She had her head in her hands. Why? I don't know. She looked very tired but her face was uplifted. Something was very wrong in her life, but this place clearly gave her a spiritual solace.

As I looked around, a young east Asian (Chinese?) man came in. He looked intense but stopped only briefly. Not sure why he was there. Was it spiritual as well? He was clearly in a rush. I think it was spiritual, but in atmosphere it felt very transactional; a bit like grabbing a coffee in Starbucks.

I wandered round the church for a while, looked at the font in which a young John Keats (sadly, there was never any other kind...) was baptised and then returned to the noise of the City of London; leaving a handful of people in the stillness and tranquility of a church built for hundreds and now used by a tiny self-selecting minority.