Pereira & Luckman's design received negative criticism when it was announced. As "Architectural Record" wrote in August 1954, some critics stated the building "looked like an enormous cigarette lighter others thought it resembled a big trophy". Bronfman's 27-year-old daughter, Phyllis Lambert, was living in Paris when she had seen a rendering of Pereira & Luckman's plan in the "New York Herald Tribune's" Paris edition. Recounting the incident later, Lambert said she had been "boiling with fury" at the proposal. Lambert wrote a letter to her father that August, writing that any new headquarters should be a "contribution" to the city in addition to serving as a symbol of Seagram. In a 2013 book recalling the building's development, Lambert recalled, "This letter starts with one word repeated very emphatically [... NO NO NO NO NO."