Adelaide Festival Centre

About

Adelaide Festival Centre, Australia's first capital city multi-purpose arts centre and the home of South Australia's performing arts, was built in the early 1970s and designed by Hassell Architects. The Festival Theatre opened in June 1973 with the rest of the centre and the Festival Plaza following soon after. Located approximately 50 metres (160 ft) north of the corner of North Terrace and King William Road, it is distinguished by its two white geometric dome roofs, and lies on a 45-degree angle to the city's grid. The complex includes Festival Theatre, Dunstan Playhouse (formerly The Playhouse and Optima Playhouse), Space Theatre (formerly The Space) and several gallery and function spaces. The centre was erected on land between Elder Park and Parliament House, and several historic buildings were demolished to make way for the new project. The Festival Centre is managed by a statutory corporation, the Adelaide Festival Centre Trust, which is responsible for encouraging and facilitating artistic, cultural and performing arts activities, as well as maintaining and improving the building and facilities of the complex and Her Majesty's Theatre. The centre hosts Adelaide Festival and...

In the 1960s, the Adelaide Festival of the Arts started to outgrow the city's existing venues, and there was a push to build a "Festival Hall". The Adelaide Festival Theatre Act 1964 provided for the erection of the Festival Theatre building. The originally proposed site was the Carclew building in North Adelaide, which had been purchased from the Bonython family by the Adelaide City Council for the purposes of building a Festival Hall.

Liberal state Premier Steele Hall lobbied the federal government for tax concessions for a public appeal for the Festival Hall, which was initially unsuccessful, until Prime Minister John Gorton offered Hall either tax concessions or A$100,000. Hall accepted the money. While on a trip to London, Steele Hall visited the Royal Festival Hall on the banks of the River Thames and decided that the banks of the River Torrens was the ideal choice for the site of the Adelaide Festival of the Arts and the cultural heart of the city. During this time, the state government changed hands, but the drive for a new centre continued with fervour. When Don Dunstan became Premier he expanded the idea into a "Festival Centre", incorporating multiple smaller venues.

The Lord Mayor of Adelaide, Robert Porter, supported by Dunstan, launched a public appeal to raise funds to build the Festival Centre and establish Adelaide as a significant city in the art world. The appeal raised its target within a week, and was soon over-subscribed; the surplus was set aside to create a collection of artworks to grace the new building. [ citation needed ]

The building was designed by Hassell, McConnell and Partners for the Adelaide City Council and the Adelaide Festival Centre Trust, and has been "hailed as a major step forward in modern architecture in South Australia". It was designed "from the inside out" and is particularly associated with the architect John Morphett AM OBE and Colin Hassell. Prior to designing the buildings, Hassell led a team which included Morphett to the United States and Europe to undertake a study of theatre designs. In 2023, the building won the Jack Cheesman Award for Enduring Architecture at the Australian Institute of Architects SA Chapter awards.

The Adelaide City Baths, which had stood on the site since their creation in 1861 were demolished in 1969 to make way for the new centre and plaza. Similarly, the Government Printing Office building, which was built circa 1880 between the baths and Parliament House, and later expanded, was also vacated and demolished. The site also housed the Elder Park Hostel, which consisted of numerous repurposed buildings near the river. It was in use from circa 1949 to circa 1969 with the site being cleared in 1970. More recently, acknowledgement has also been made that the site is located on historical Kaurna lands.

Adelaide Festival Centre was built in three parts, from April 1970 to 1980. The main building, the Festival Theatre, was completed in 1973, within its budget of A$10 million. On 2 June 1973, Festival Theatre was officially opened by Prime Minister Gough Whitlam at a gala performance of Act Two, Scene 1 of Beethoven 's opera Fidelio and Choral Symphony. The construction of the Playhouse (now Dunstan Playhouse), Space Theatre, and Amphitheatre followed. [ citation needed ] The whole complex was completed for A$21 million (By comparison, the Sydney Opera House, completed in 1973, cost A$102 million.). The Festival Plaza, initially known as the Southern Plaza, was completed on 22 March 1977.

South of complex, in the Festival Plaza, an environmental sculpture was created by West German artist Otto Hajek [ de ], which he called Adelaide Urban Iconography. It has also been referred to as "Hajek's Plaza", and was believed to be the largest artwork in Australia.

Other sculptures graced the outdoor spaces, including the prominent stainless steel Tetrahedra, also known as Environmental Sculpture and Tetrahedrons, by Bert Flugelman.

After its opening in 1977, the plaza stirred debate and opinions were mixed, but its designs were seen to "consciously exemplify the new practices and relations embodied in the concept of environmental art ". Designed in a brutalist style, it was labelled as empty and ugly by some, but was nonetheless an artwork of its times. In 1977, it was awarded a " brickbat " by the Civic Trust, but Australia Post honoured the sculpture in 1986 by issuing a commemorative stamp for South Australia's sesquicentenary. Hajek's wife, artist and poet Katja Hajek [ de ], wrote in 2001 that the plaza "is well-known in the world of art and became acknowledged as an artistically outstanding creation of the last quarter of the 20th century".

In the decades following the plaza's opening, its painted surfaces, fountains and vegetation were not well-maintained, there were some problems with its concrete decking, it was not used for events, and, crucially, it did not attract incidental foot traffic to interact with its forms. In 1987, the fountain, unused for the prior three years owing to a leak, was demolished as part of a A$11 million upgrade of the plaza.

In 2002–2003, the area around the centre was redeveloped substantially. The Festival Plaza was redesigned, including opening the underground roadway to the sky. Although a pedestrian suspension bridge was built on its west side, the Plaza was essentially isolated as a result of this redevelopment.

In 2013, the government announced that the Plaza would be further redeveloped, with Hajek's work decommissioned and replaced. The removal of such a significant public work of art was seen as vandalism by some commentators, including Hajek's wife. However, not everyone in the world of art and architecture or the general public mourned its passing.

From 2016, the Plaza underwent A$90 million redevelopment, as part of the major redevelopment of the Riverbank Precinct. The new public plaza is known as the Public Realm. The architects of the original complex, Hassell, served as architectural consultants for the project, in collaboration with ARM Architecture and landscape architects Taylor Cullity Lethlean for the outdoor spaces. Changes to the design of the Festival Plaza Public Realm submitted for approval in April 2020 pushed back the completion date to 2023. by Bert Flugelman's sculptures Vertical Variation and Tetrahedra, along with Sundial by Owen Broughton, have been refurbished and reinstalled in the outdoor spaces.

In 2024, Festival Tower, sited on land that was previously a corner of the Festival Plaza adjacent to the station, was also completed. Construction of Festival Tower Two by Walker Corporation began in early 2026. Dubbed "Adelaide's first skyscraper", it is designed to be 160 m (520 ft) tall. It is located between Parliament House and the Festival centre, next to Festival Tower One, above the underground Festival Car Park. A group called Save Festival Plaza Alliance is opposing the construction of the tower. The overall external redevelopment is expected to be completed in 2028.

Interior refurbishment of the Festival Centre was undertaken from August 2025, with the building closed for around six months. In a redevelopment designed by Cox Architecture costing A$55 million, the main infrastructure was upgraded, stage flooring in Dunstan Playhouse and Space Theatre refurbished, seating replaced with high-quality Figueras seating, and fire safety was improved. In addition, a new restaurant called Angry Penguins, honouring the legacy of poet and writer Max Harris and his literary magazine of the same name, was created as the centrepiece of the refurbishment. The Festival Centre's reopening coincides with the 2026 Adelaide Festival on 27 February.

In the 1960s, the Adelaide Festival of the Arts started to outgrow the city's existing venues, and there was a push to build a "Festival Hall". The Adelaide Festival Theatre Act 1964 provided for the erection of the Festival Theatre building. The originally proposed site was the Carclew building in North Adelaide, which had been purchased from the Bonython family by the Adelaide City Council for the purposes of building a Festival Hall.

Liberal state Premier Steele Hall lobbied the federal government for tax concessions for a public appeal for the Festival Hall, which was initially unsuccessful, until Prime Minister John Gorton offered Hall either tax concessions or A$100,000. Hall accepted the money. While on a trip to London, Steele Hall visited the Royal Festival Hall on the banks of the River Thames and decided that the banks of the River Torrens was the ideal choice for the site of the Adelaide Festival of the Arts and the cultural heart of the city. During this time, the state government changed hands, but the drive for a new centre continued with fervour. When Don Dunstan became Premier he expanded the idea into a "Festival Centre", incorporating multiple smaller venues.

The Lord Mayor of Adelaide, Robert Porter, supported by Dunstan, launched a public appeal to raise funds to build the Festival Centre and establish Adelaide as a significant city in the art world. The appeal raised its target within a week, and was soon over-subscribed; the surplus was set aside to create a collection of artworks to grace the new building. [ citation needed ]

The building was designed by Hassell, McConnell and Partners for the Adelaide City Council and the Adelaide Festival Centre Trust, and has been "hailed as a major step forward in modern architecture in South Australia". It was designed "from the inside out" and is particularly associated with the architect John Morphett AM OBE and Colin Hassell. Prior to designing the buildings, Hassell led a team which included Morphett to the United States and Europe to undertake a study of theatre designs. In 2023, the building won the Jack Cheesman Award for Enduring Architecture at the Australian Institute of Architects SA Chapter awards.