The architect with one famous building
Nora Bell was an architect who rose to international stardom through the widely acclaimed 1962 Riverside Public Library. In the project, which enjoyed (17) ________ success worldwide and remains widely admired, she designed the spacious main public hall, a calm and open room connected by a carefully landscaped garden to the original (18) ________ courtyard of an old courthouse, preserved behind the new library. Despite the library's (19) ________ acclaim, however, it was to be her only major commission. While Nora later insisted that she enjoyed the experience immensely, she was (20) ________ to the life of a celebrity architect. An intensely private individual, she lacked the drive and ambition of (21) ________ working in architecture and film, and went on to reject all later set-design offers from directors and (22) ________. Though students continued to contact her with requests for (23) ________ drawings six decades later, letters went (24) ________ and requests for interviews were seldom granted.