Sydney's Opera House was designed by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, who won a competition for the project in 1956. Uzton stormed off the project later, due to disputes over his design

July 9, 1999
Web posted at: 4:29 p.m. EDT (2029 GMT)

In this story: Reconciling with the architect Going for more than just concerts RELATED RESOURCES, SITES

SYDNEY, Australia (CNN) -- Around every bend in Australia, there are natural beauties and magnificent vistas. But perhaps nothing identifies the country more than a breathtaking view of the Sydney Opera House.

The Opera House, designed by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, is lauded by many as one of the architectural wonders of the modern world. It attracts 90 percent of tourists who visit Sydney and acts as a major home to the performing arts in Australia.

The site of the opera house is some 500 yards from where the first European colonists landed in 1788. Fort Macquarie was established there at Bennelong Point in 1821. A tram depot came along in 1902. Trams were phased out in the 1950s, not long after Sydney Symphony Orchestra conductor Eugene Goossens began actively floating the idea of a concert hall. A government official seized on the concept and established an advisory committee, which selected the site of the old tram shed as the new home of the Sydney Opera House.

In 1956, the government announced an international design competition. Utzon won the next year with his distinctive "soaring sails" vision of a harborside center. He said his idea for the structure had come from a simple source: the orange.

"All the shells are cut out of the same sphere," says Michael Lynch, chief executive of the Opera House Trust, "and now all have a common denominator."

In an interesting aside, renowned American architect Frank Lloyd Wright didn't approve of the blueprints. "The circus tent is not architecture," Wright said.

Construction of the Opera House took almost a decade and a half, and cost US $66 million, more than 14 times original projections

Construction began in 1959. It was supposed to take four years and cost $7 million Australian (US $4.7 million) -- to be paid from lottery revenues. That turned out to be an unrealistic figure.

"They went through extraordinary difficulty in trying to make the building work," Lynch says. "The sails themselves are all made out of pre-stressed concrete at a point where that was pretty much cutting-edge technology."

Construction wasn't finished until 14 years later in 1973, with a $100 million Australian (US $66 million) price tag. Utzon didn't stick around for the completion. He left in 1966, disgusted with changes the New South Wales government wanted to make to his design -- as early as the first year of construction, for example, officials had demanded he double the number of performance spaces in the facility.

Utzon vowed never to return. "I don't care if they pull the opera house down," he's reported to have said.

The architect, now 81, apparently has had some change of heart over the years. The Sydney Morning Herald reports that he's agreed to help Australian architects upgrade the building. The article says they'll travel to the Spanish island of Majorca to consult with Utzon on redesigning the interior to match the exterior. Utzon is not expected to come to Sydney for the project.

The ceiling of the Opera House. The architect said the design concept came from an orange: 'Shells ... cut out of the same sphere'

The complex boasts several performance halls that carry every genre of entertainment, from jazz to ballet. An estimated 3,000 performances each year are seen by about two million people.

"I think it's one of the great performance arts centers in the world," Lynch says. "The performing arts in Australia have blossomed, I think, largely because of the role that this building plays."

Visitors are drawn to more than the performances. The complex holds cafes and shops, too. Today, more than 300,000 visitors tour the opera house each year.

And with the eyes of the world turning to Australia for the year 2000 and its Summer Olympic Games there, it's a safe bet that the Sydney Opera House will remain the nation's true center stage.

CNN Entertainment News Correspondent Lauren Hunter, the Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

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