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Melbourne Open House or "MOH", Sunday, July 20, 2008 (10am – 5pm) is a free of charge event giving Melburnians and visitors to the city a rare opportunity to discover the often hidden wealth of design, architectural, engineering and historic ‘gems’ nestled around the city.

In 2008, its inaugural year, Melbourne Open House focuses on opening a selection of inspiring buildings within walking distance of Federation Square (see MOH 2008) and the Melbourne International Design Festival.

Melbourne Open House is proud to be associated with the Melbourne International Design Centre and the National Design Centre and have aligned our opening day to coincide with their very successful ‘design market’.

In future years, Melbourne Open House will focus on a wider range of buildings in various locations across Melbourne and will include best practice examples of, medium density housing, environmentally sustainable design and architectural award winners.
 

Melbourne Town Hall

90-130 Swanston Street
www.melbourne.vic.gov.au
Built: 1867-70
Architect: Joseph Reed and Frederick Barnes
Owner: City of Melbourne

Built between 1867 and 1870, Melbourne Town Hall rekindles the glory of Victoria's Gold Boom. Recent renovations have preserved its original grandeur and unique period features such as the impressive wood-panelled Council Chamber.

Open to MOH: Level 2 rooms including the Council Chamber, The Portico Room and balcony, The Melbourne Room, The Yarra Room and the Lord Mayor's office.
Times: 10am to 5pm
Access restrictions: Full access available
Another distinguished work by Reed and Barnes that celebrates its corner site with a campanile (this time in grand French Renaissance style), this is a resoundingly picturesque urban composition. The progressive additions of the Prince Alfred Tower (1869), temple-like portico (1887), the subsequent enlargement of the hall itself and the creation of the lower hall and extension along Collins Street (1925) have contributed to the building's scenographic form.

The exterior Tasmanian freestone facades sitting above a rusticated bluestone plinth are modulated by giant order Corinthian pilasters and attached Corinthian columns overlaid onto a richly modelled composition. The clock tower with its mansard roof and stacked classical composition houses clocks donated by the son of Melbourne's first mayor.

A magnificent collection of classically composed pavilions, the Melbourne Town Hall was to be the prototype for numerous suburban town halls that would be built in the late 1870s and 1880s.

Source: "A guide to Melbourne architecture", by Philip Goad, 1999, p. 41. The Watermark Press, Sydney.

Capitol Theatre

109-117 Swanston Street
Built: 1921-24
Architect: Walter Burley and Marion Mahoney Griffin
Owner: RMIT

Capitol Theatre was Melbourne's crowning architectural achievement in the twenty years after Federation. It is notable for a number of pioneering concepts including its marvellous stained glass details and magical geometric plaster ceilings.

Open to MOH: Level 1, main theatre space (up the stairs to the right)
Times: 10 am to 5pm
Access restrictions: Disabled access to theatre via ground floor lift, located on the right hand side after the main theatre stairs.
When this cinema opened in 1924, the public flocked to hear the Wurlitzer organ and see the movies and the spectacular light show afforded by the Griffins' plaster ceiling design. Like a crystal-hung cave, thousands of concealed coloured lights were gradually illuminated to provide a fantastic atmospheric experience. It was a space that evoked spiritual transcendence, but the interior of 'living rock' was not the direct romantic evocation of a Tuscan garden as seen in the later Forum. It was certainly otherworldly, but the image was distinctly architectural, suggesting a stepped pyramid form, the mystical essence of an original and arguably natural monument.

The Capitol was also of technical interest. To achieve such a dramatic ceiling, massive reinforced concrete portals allowed the interior structure to be hung uninterrupted by any internal columns. Outside, the Capitol is also distinctive. Two deep cornices cap two pylon motifs each of three vertical piers extending over the entire height of the facade. It is, as historian Jeffrey Turnbull has suggested, like a giant gateway. Cinema historian Ross Thorne has described it as, '...not a mere breath of fresh air wafting through the design offices of Melbourne, it was a howling gale of modernity sweeping out every vestige of revivalist decorative stylism.'

Tragically, in the 1960s, the owners decided to insert a shopping arcade right through the middle of the auditorium. A campaign to save the theatre was waged and a compromise was reached: the cave-like foyers were destroyed and a new floor was inserted. Many of the original lobby and vestibule spaces were either destroyed or boarded up, but the ceiling was saved.

In recent years, great efforts have been made to restore surviving elements of the theatre. The dramatic cantilevering street canopy with its light globes and skylights is the most significant recent restoration.

RMIT purchased the theatre in 1999 and has undertaken further refurbishment work, including the repainting of the auditorium ceiling and the installation of new seating. The Capitol is used primarily as a lecture theatre and for special events. The theatre is open to the public for guided tours on the third Friday of the month.*

In 1965, Robin Boyd wrote eloquently in The Australian about the Capitol:

"When you reach the last flight of stairs, you approach one of the architectural sights of Australia. At the top of the stairs it bursts upon you. It is only a picture theatre. It is only plaster. Yet in its own way it is sheer magic."

Magic, it still is. The Capitol was Melbourne's crowning architectural achievement in the twenty years after Federation.

Source: "A guide to Melbourne architecture", by Philip Goad, 1999, p. 105. The Watermark Press, Sydney.

*For further information on the guided tours please contact RMIT University on (03) 9925 2415.

Manchester Unity Building

91 Swanston Street
www.mubb.com.au

Built: 1929-1932
Architect: Marcus Barlow
Inspired by the Chicago Tribune Tower (1922), the Manchester Unity Building represented a new faith in commerce and progress in inter-war Melbourne. Manchester Unity was the tallest building in Melbourne in 1932 and the first building in Victoria to have escalators as well as the largest diesel generator at its time in Australia to power three high-speed lifts.

Open to MOH: Level 11 - The Boardroom
Times: 10 am to 5pm
Access restrictions: No disability access, three steps up to enter hallway in foyer, then three steps down to reach boardroom entrance.
The pinnacles of the Manchester Unity Building made it the tallest building in Melbourne when it was finished in 1932. Built during the Depression using round-the-clock eight-hour shifts, the termination of Manchester Unity's corner tower in Commercial Gothic Modern style has its inspiration in Raymond Hood's competition-winning design for the Chicago Tribune Tower (1922).

The building is faced in a gold-brown glazed faience and elaborated by figures of benevolence and charity. As if in commercial challenge to the municipal clock tower of the Melbourne Town Hall and the spires of St Paul's, the size of the limit-height building proclaimed that the new force in the urban skyline was commerce.

The ceiling and upper walls of the ground floor arcade reveal the mores of the day, with sculptural tableaus of industrious Victorians. Outside, the street canopy is a fine example of the sophisticated move from posted verandas to decorated cantilevered canopies.

Perhaps Marcus Barlow's crowning achievement as an architect, it was joined by Barlow's Century Building (1938-40), thus creating one of Melbourne's most distinctive limit-height streetscapes between Swanston and Little Collins streets.

Source: "A guide to Melbourne architecture", by Philip Goad, 1999, p. 129. The Watermark Press, Sydney

Plaza Ballroom, Regent Theatre

191 Collins Street
www.marrinertheatres.com.au

Built: 1929-30
Architect: 1929-30 Cedric H Ballantyne, 1945 Cowper Murphy & Appleford (restoration); 1994 Allom Lovell & Associates (restoration).
Owner: Marriner Theatres
The Plaza Ballroom, Regent Theatre is a magnificent heritage-listed venue set at the heart of Melbourne at the famous Regent Theatre. As Melbourne's grandest 'picture palace' the Plaza Ballroom draws heavily on American cinema design.

Open to MOH: Plaza Ballroom
Times: 10 am to 5pm
Access restrictions: Stair access only.
The Plaza Ballroom, Regent Theatre, built in 1929, is decorated in an exotic Spanish Colonial style, extremely popular in the United States, and introduced to Australia at Melbourne's Comedy Theatre that opened a year before. The style has since been replicated many times, including the Melbourne Plaza in George Street, Sydney.

The Plaza Foyer emulates a Spanish courtyard with small fountain, and paved floor. In the Ballroom, above the promenades on either side are walls pierced by faux windows, backlit to simulate moonlight. The proscenium is richly detailed and flanked by curved 'Juliette' balconies. Ornate bronze chandeliers hang from the Aztec ceiling, which is an eye-dazzling grid of intersecting beams, with every surface colourfully embellished with heraldic emblems in hand-painted tempera.

Disaster struck in 1945 when both the Regent Theatre and Plaza Ballroom were destroyed by fire. Rebuilt by Cowper Murphy & Appleford, and meticulously restored to its former glory, Marriner Theatres reopened the doors on 17th August 1996, and today, the Plaza Ballroom stands today more lavish and grand than ever.

Source: Marriner Theatres

Council House 2

240 Little Collins Street
www.ch2.com.au
Built: 2006
Architect: City of Melbourne in collaboration with Design Inc
Owner: City of Melbourne

CH2 is the first purpose built office building in Australia to achieve the six Green Star certified rating with sustainable technologies incorporated into every conceivable part of its 10 storeys.

Open to MOH: Ground floor foyer, Level 6 office, Level 9 office and roof top terrace
Time: 10am to 5pm
Access restrictions: Full access available
The CH2 project is the first purpose built office building in Australia to achieve the six Green Star certified rating, where the minimum rating is one star and maximum is six. This achievement is also significant as the design for the project started prior to the launch of the Green Star Rating System and Green Star - Office Design.

The Green Star rating system separately evaluates the environmental design and performance of Australian buildings based on a number of criteria, including energy and water efficiency, quality of indoor environments and resource conservation.

CH2 has sustainable technologies incorporated into every conceivable part of its 10 storeys. A water-mining plant in the basement, phase-change materials for cooling, automatic night-purge windows, wavy concrete ceilings, a facade of louvres (powered by photovoltaic cells) that track the sun - even the pot plant holders have involved a whole new way of thinking.

Although most of the principles adopted in the building are not new - such as using thermal mass for cooling and using plants to filter the light - never before in Australia have they been used in such a comprehensive, interrelated fashion in an office building.

Referenced from www.melbourne.vic.gov.au

The Chapter House, St Paul's Cathedral

197 Flinders Lane

Built: 1891
Architect: William Butterfield
Owner: Melbourne Anglican Trust Corporation
The neo-gothic-style Chapter House is an impressive sandstone and blackwood heritage building, built in 1891. It has since been lovingly restored to its original glory.

Open to MOH: Second floor hall
Times: 10 am to 5pm
Access restrictions: Disabled lift access available via lift off Flinders Lane entrance.
In style and materials, the four-storey structure is similar to neighbouring St Paul's Cathedral, and forms an essential component of the arcade and square precinct between the cathedral and neo-gothic neighbours.

Referenced from www.walkingmelbourne.com

Designed by noted English architect William Butterfield, the Chapter House was for decades a meeting place of Church leaders. The Chapter House was built in 1891 in neo-Gothic style. Butterfield's original octagonal design was altered into a splendid rectangular building to accommodate the Synod and Diocesan administration for many years.

By 1985 they no longer used the Chapter House. The building gradually fell into disrepair and was seldom used. It was not until 1994 that extensive renovation began to faithfully restore and convert the building to an outstanding function venue.

Referenced from www.peterrowland.com.au.
Should you wish to hire this venue please contact Peter Rowland Catering.

St Paul's Cathedral

2 Swanston Street
www.stpaulscathedral.org.au

Built: 1880-91
Architect: William Butterfield & Joseph Reed
Owner: Melbourne Anglican Trust Corporation
Standing at the centre of the Anglican Church in Victoria is St Paul's Cathedral. This landmark building is unique among Melbourne's great 19th century public buildings as it is made from sandstone, rather than the city's dominant bluestone building material. Barrabool sandstone and Waurn Ponds limestone, with spires of Hawkesbury sandstone from Sydney suffuse the cathedral in a warm yellow-brown, rather than Melbourne's characteristic cold blue-grey.

Open to MOH: The Bell Tower, Bridge Gallery over Nave and Main Church
Times: Please note, St Paul's Cathedral will only be open 12:30pm to 5pm to minimise disruption to normal Sunday services.
Access restrictions: Full access to the Cathedral. Disabled access to the building via Flinders St. Families and children are welcome. Access to the bell tower will only occur with a member of Cathedral staff and will be limited to groups of six at a time. Children under 12 will not be permitted. As the access way is via tight spiral stairs access is limited to people who are of do not suffer from mobility restrictions, claustrophobia or vertigo.
Built to replace Charles Webb's St Paul's Church and located on the site of the first official church service in Melbourne in 1836, St Paul's Cathedral has continued the site's history as the centre of the Anglican Church in Victoria. Designed in 1878 by eminent English Gothic Revival architect William Butterfield (who never visited Australia and who also designed Adelaide's Anglican cathedral), St Paul's is one of his larger commissions, although it was not completed to his original design - the existing spires are not those of Butterfield.

He had envisaged an octagonal crossing tower and two saddle-backed west towers, which would have given an altogether different feeling - a more rugged, robust and some might say even primitive Gothic evocation. Instead, Sydney architect John Barr provided the conventional Gothic spires and in a different stone to Butterfield's bold contrasting textures of Waurns Pond and Barrabool sandstones (described as 'polytexture') which feature on the chequered western facade (in fact, south facade due to having to conform to Melbourne's street grid). Despite this, the interior is almost entirely Butterfield and is a triumph of Gothic Revival architecture inspired by the vibrant striped polychromy of Italian Gothic cathedral interiors.

Butterfield's philosophy of an increasing decorative hierarchy is realised at St Paul's. Encaustic tiled floors and wainscoting give way to marble and glass mosaics as one moves closer to the altar. The karri ceiling, while fine in workmanship and execution, was not part of the Butterfield design. He resigned from the commission in 1888 after a disagreement with the Cathedral Erection Board, but his work was continued in 1888 in an honorary capacity by Joseph Reed of Reed Henderson & Smart (later Reed, Smart & Tappin).

The adjacent four-storey Chapter House and Diocesan Offices were designed in the office of Joseph Reed and complement the cathedral design. While St Paul's Cathedral has a mixed architectural pedigree, its skyline of spires is a much-loved Melbourne landmark.

With the 1997 removal of the Gas and Fuel Buildings which had sat over the railyards, the adjacent Flinders Street streetscape was revealed to recapture a view of Melbourne as it had appeared from 1931 until the mid-1960s.

In the late 1990s, controversy raged over whether the proposed structures of Federation Square would partially obscure the spires and upper half of St Paul's west facade. Many people had forgotten that the cathedral had no spires at all for more than 30 years. The cathedral, like Melbourne at the end of the 1870s, was constantly evolving.

Source: "A guide to Melbourne architecture", by Philip Goad, 1999, p. 51. The Watermark Press, Sydney, with corrections.

The Labyrinth, Federation Square

Corner Swanston & Flinders Streets
www.fedsquare.com.au

Built: 2002
Architects: Lab Architecture Studio in association with Bates Smart
Owner: Fed Square Pty Ltd

FULLY BOOKED - Due to immense public interest in MOH, access to The Labyrinth has been fully booked and there is no further availability for this space in MOH 2008. There are however 7 other beautiful and fascinating buildings to explore on the day.

Beneath the familiar angles and architectural planes of Federation Square lies a rarely seen labyrinth of concrete tunnels. This subterranean maze is used to cool the building and will be open for all to see during Melbourne Open House.

Open to MOH: The Labyrinth (area below the main plaza used to cool the building)
Times: 10 am to 5pm
Access restrictions: We also advise that this is a confined space and people suffering from claustrophobia may not wish to visit this space.
The Labyrinth, so called because of its maze of corrugated concrete walls, is a unique passive cooling system. It is used to provide environmental climate control (cooling) for the Atrium and BMW Edge. Almost 40 x 40 metres and 1.2 km in length, the Labyrinth is positioned beneath the Square but above the actual deck over the rail lines.

Utilising the specific climatic qualities of Melbourne, cool air is pumped through the Labyrinth's cells at night, cooling the concrete walls. By day, air is gently pumped through the cells, the air cooled in turn by the concrete walls. In winter the Labyrinth's thermal mass maintains an inherent warming potential that can be supplemented as required.

The system directs air to the Atrium, dispersed by use of a low-velocity displacement system at floor level. In peak summer conditions, the Labyrinth is capable of delivering air to the Atrium at up to 12°C below the external ambient temperature, equivalent to conventional air conditioning, but using one tenth of the energy consumption and generating less than one-tenth of the CO2 emissions.

http://www.melbourneopenhouse.org