Australia’s Federal Capital City

Progress, Volume IX, Issue 12, 1 August 1914, Page 1201

Australia’s Federal Capital City

Parliament House Competition The details of this rather long delayed competition have now come to hand, and architects desiring to compete can get Registration forms and Programmes from the Public Works Department at Wellington or from the Department of Home Affairs, Melbourne. This competition will be competed for by architects from all over the world and we hope that a New Zealand Architect will win the first prize of £2,000. There is a second prize of £1,500, and a Capitol Parliament Hill Hill

dation does not entitle the said architect to any right for such future employment. These conditions are mandatory, and failure on part of a competitor to conform to the same will exclude his design. Qualification of Applicants. —lntending competitors are required to acknowledge receipt of Programme of Competition on accompanying Registration Form indicating responsible architectural practice in design and supervision of building construction. Satisfactory compliance with this condition will be a first essential to candidacy for employment in connexion with the execution of this work. No adjudicator nor advisor nor employe of the Commonwealth of Australia shall compete or assist a competitor. No competitor shall submit more than one design.

third of £I,OOO, a fourth of £SOO, and four additional prizes for the next four in order of merit of £250 each, making a total of eight prizes altogether. Conditions have been elaborately drawn up the main features of which we give below. Purpose. The Government of the Commonwealth of Australia, having under construction the Federal Capital City at Canberra, desires to secure the services of an architect or architects to design, in harmony with the objects and policies of the general design for the city, the first of its important public buildings. The foremost, of these buildings in importance and in order of construction is Parliament House, for which tentative designs are invited in international competition open to all qualified architects. If any premiated design additional to the first shall have been specially commended by the Adjudicators on account of , exceptional merit, it is possible that the Commonwealth may subsequently commission the author thereof in connexion with other buildings at the Capital; but it must be understood that such commen-

Special Information. Additional information, if necessitated by circumstances, will be forwarded by the Federal Capital Director of Design and Construction to all registered competitors. Preparation. All the drawings required shall be drawn with pencil or pen, without wash or colours, except plain washes if desired, to indicate sections or to block in openings or to show different planes of distances. All lettering shall be of plain legible type. All rooms shall have figured dimensions. All drawings shall be cloth-mounted on stretchers. The only drawings to be submitted are: — (1) Plan of each floor of Parliament House; (2) Longitudinal section of Parliament House; (3) Transverse section of Parliament House; (4) 3 Elevations of Parliament House; (5) Perspective from direction of “ Terrace Court of the Reservoir, ’ indicating relationship with proposed future Departmental and Capitol Buildings. Scale x Vineh per 1 foot at nearest angle on picture planet (6) Detail of one architectural feature of the building, selection optional.

A brief description, in print or typewritten, unsigned, must accompany the drawings, including a statement of the total volume of the ultimate building in terms of cubic feet. Cubage shall be computed to indicate as exactly as possible the actual volume of the building, calculated from the surface level or levels of the lowest floor to the highest points of the roof, and contained within the various outside surfaces of the walls. The actual volume of projecting features of all sorts, including parapets, towers, lanterns, bays, dormers, vaults, and exterior steps above grades shall be included, but covered open-sided porticos or loggias shall be taken at half their volume. Light wells of less than 400 square feet area shall not be deducted.

A figured diagram, showing method adopted in computing volume, shall accompany each design. Any language may be used at the option of the Competitor. Submission. Designs shall be submitted without revealing the registered address of the competitor or hearing any distinguishing mark, motto, or name which could serve as means of indentification, but with a sealed opaque packet firmly attached containing name and address of the author or authors, with a declaration that the design is his or their own personal work, and that the drawings have been prepared throughout under his or their own personal supervision. Such packet and the design to which it is attached will be given a common number on receipt, and the former will be held and opened after adjudication only by his Excellency the Gov-ernor-General or his deputy. Any attempt by an author to disclose his indentity in any other manner will disqualify his design, and such design will not be included in the competition. The designs shall be delivered to the Federal Capital Director of Design and Construction, Melbourne,, Australia, or to the High Commissioner of Australia, London, England, free.of cost to the Commonwealth, on or before 31st March, 1915. • Omission to so deliver will involve disqualification, unless the Commonwealth Minister of State for Home Affairs is satisfied that the delay could not have been forseen and is only for a period that will not interfere with the work of investigation and adjudication. » Custody.— The Government does not accept responsibility as regards safe transit, custody, or retransit of the designs or any documents forwarded or delivered by a competitor, but it undertakes that all reasonable care shall be exercised to prevent damage during the period in which they are in its possession and that insurance will be effected based on its own estimate of value. ‘ Publicity.— All designs and documents not excluded from the competition may be exhibited for reasonable period after adjudication, such exhibition to be open free to the public. Publication of designs, .whether premiated or unpremiated, will in no way entitle competitors to any claim for compensation against the Government or its agents in regard to proprietary or other rights. ; Return. The winning design shall become, the property of the Government. All other designs will be repacked and shipped or posted for return to the several competitors. Each competitor will be ad-

vised of their, despatch, Freight and other charges in transit will be paid by the Government to the address so named by the competitor. Adjudication. — The drawings will be adjudicated by a jury of architects as follows :—George T. Poole of Australia; John James Burnet of London and Glasgow; Victor Laloux of Paris; Otto Wagner of Vienna ; Louis H. Sullivan of Chicago. In case of disability of any adjudicator, his successor will be appointed by the Federal Capital Director of Design and Construction,

The jury will examine all designs submitted, determine as to their conformity with the mandatory conditions, and select eight (8) designs in order of merit and accord mention to such others as may be

deemed especially worthy. The decision of the jury will be final, and its announcement will be made in Melbourne within three months of date, of receipt of designs, or as soon, thereafter as is possible. The report of the jury will state its reasons for the selection and classification of the designs, in order of merit, and a copy, accompanied by the names of the prize winners, will be sent by the Federal Capital Director of Design and Construction to each competitor.

Immediately upon the opening of the indentification envelopes by the Governor-General the prize winners will be notified by telegraph. Employment of Architect.— The Government will employ the competitor placed first by the jury as architect for the initial portion of the building; and so far as the subsequent stages of the ultimate building are, concerned, it is the intention of the Government similarly to employ him. Insomuch, however, as the construction of the ultimate building may spread over a number of years, this statement

cannot be taken to bind the Government to employ the architect in these later stages. Extent op the Service required. — The employment of the competitor as architect for the construction of the building, or any part thereof, is to include the preparation of all such working drawings and specifications in connexion with the work to be constructed and the furnishing of all such information in connexion therewith as the Minister for Home Affairs may require and the furnishing to the Minister of necessary copies thereof and the supply of one permanent copy on tracing linen of the plans, elevations, and sections of the work as executed, and also a permanent copy of all corrected details of the work and figured plans and diagrams of all ducts, wires, pipes, and appliances for service systems inside and outside the building. If the Government decides to require personal supervision by the competitor employed as architect, he shall, in addition to the above, faithfully and diligently personally supervise the execution of the work, and perform all such architectural services in connexion therewith as are necessary to insure the complete carrying out of his design. No departure from the working drawings and specifications is to be permitted without written approval of the Minister for Home Affairs. Remuneration.— The i architect will be remunerated for his services as follows: (a) If the employment includes personal supervision of the execution of the work, he will be remunerated in accordance with the sche-

chile of percentage charges santioned and published by the Royal Institute of British Architects as at the date of the first publication of this programme in the Commonwealth Gazette; or (&) If his employment does not include personal supervision of the work he will be remunerated at the rate of 3 per cent, on the calculated cost of the actual work undertaken. The following intimations are advisory and contain no recommendations that need be considered mandatory:— The Australian Commonwealth, with no histor-ically-evolved suitable architectural style, but with unique scope in its unlimited open continent for national growth, with this virgin city site under unified control, and possessed of modern building science, appliances, and materials, is in a position to exact unity in plan and homogeneity in expression and harmony with whole natural environment beyond any ordinary opportunity. Since the city is to evolve gradually, the desired unity cannot be assured by personality, nor can it under popular government be established by authoritative decree of any arbitrary type. Hence it is desired that the standard of design be the expression of actual functions through practical organic planning; through the direct adaptation of the inherent characteristics of the materials used, avoiding the intrusion of irrelevant features, however time-honoured, on the one hand, or individual on the other; and through recognition of the peculiar site conditions. Parlia-

ment House, with the whole Government Group, is but an element in a larger system of parallel-set public edifices, all regulated by the same standard, which is intended to extend through the entire city and to characterise it. Hence, appropriate scale and relationship to the other masses is imperative. To illustrate the conception of general relationship of important structuresbut not their style—are appended plans, elevations, and sections of the Government Group, and a general perspective view of the Capital from the preliminary city design. Following on the above conditions, etc., are full details of the site, accommodation and facilities, etc., with illustrations of site, elevation and section, diagrams of Public and Government groups of buildings and a plan of Canberra similar to the one published in July Progress. We publish the plan of the Government Group site and a view of Canberra from a painting by W. Lister Lister.