THE tactic is more redolent of Stalinist Russia than the rarefied air of an architect’s office. A “team photo” of employees of Lord Foster, who has designed some of the world’s most famous buildings, has been “airbrushed”, downgrading the importance of the architect’s former right-hand man.

In the original photograph Ken Shuttleworth, a former senior partner, is in pride of place beside Foster. Shuttleworth is credited by many with being one of the creative forces behind Foster’s “gherkin” tower in the City of London.

In the published version, however, included in a new book of Foster’s work, Shuttleworth has been shunted sideways and back one row into the crowd of some 350 workers.

Graham Phillips, a senior partner who was away when the main photograph was taken, has been pasted into the prime slot at Foster’s right hand.

News of the picture doctoring will add to a dispute in the world of architecture over whether Shuttleworth — nicknamed “Ken the Pen” for his rapid, immaculate draughtsmanship — has been given credit for his role in the gherkin.

Shuttleworth, 52, left Foster’s firm in December after almost 30 years to start a rival practice, Make. He employs 18 former Foster staff.

This weekend he was adamant that there was no rift with his former master, but was mystified about his demotion to the ranks. “I don’t know why he has done it. I was there for 30 years and did a huge amount of work for him and it was fantastic. It is quite sad,” he said.

Shuttleworth added that the first he had known about the change in the photograph, originally taken in 2002, was when he was in a bookshop buying the fourth volume of Foster’s Works, published this month.

“I was flipping through it and noticed the picture at the back and thought: that wasn’t like that,” he said.

Another former Foster employee, who declined to be named, was more forthright. “It was because he was one of the bigwigs who left that they moved him,” she said. “None of the others in the photo who left have been moved. A bit of competition is fair enough.”

She added: “He (Shuttleworth) looks like a nobody now (in the picture). It is just silly.”

While Shuttleworth describes his relations with Foster as “amicable”, others have said that his key role in the design of the gherkin — headquarters of Swiss Re, the insurance firm — has not been fully acknowledged.

Hugh Pearman, architecture correspondent of The Sunday Times, said: “With large architectural projects, it is never one person. Ken has as much right to claim Swiss Re as Foster.”

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