The Sydney Opera House was a Financial Disaster

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[adam]

The Opera House is one of those rare situations where you go: hang the expense, it was totally worth it. I love that place.

[jsleeio]

other Sydney Opera House trivia: the biggest events it has hosted were outside, like the famous Crowded House concert in 1996 with 250k attendees. Also for some of the year it has a resident long-nosed fur seal named Benny who lounges in the sun at the northern VIP steps which are quite close to water level

[peterwilliams]

The Opera House was built without a carpark. This was later remedied by drilling a huge, vertical cylindrical shaft nearby and installing an 8-level double-helix carpark - which is a pretty unique construction in its own right. If you drive down to the bottom of the spiral, you only actually travel every second level, then you cut across the bottom and spiral up the intermediate levels.

[wittibear]

Being Sydney born and having lived here all my life, I would have been 3 when the Opera House opened. I have attended operas, concerts and celebrations both in and on its steps. I have even performed on one of its stages and taken young choirs to perform there.
It brings tears to my eyes to visit such a wonderful venue and I could not imagine my city without its iconic “sails”.

[andrewthorpe]

If you saw what was there before, the Sydney Opera House is a millionfold improvement.

It was a tram shed made of black stone that called like a child's clay model of a castle.

[martinavery]

There were 2 controversial, expensive projects in Australia at the time. The Opera House & the purchase of 24 F-111C fighter bombers for 240 million after cost blow outs. The F-111s are long gone, the Opera House keeps on giving

[Equine_frederikke]

🇩🇰Definitely one of the most iconic buildings in the world, and a silhouette that’s recognized world wide.
As a dane I’m very proud of it!
Think about the shape, and what it reminds people of, sails, shells etc., but more importantly what it doesn’t; it’s not a phallic powerplay, not a mausoleum, not another revival of gothic style, not Brutalism. It’s organic flowing timelessness all of it’s own and I applaud Sydney for building it!

[ashleybellofsydney]

The Sydney Opera Hose opened in 1973. That was 51 years ago. Any 'financial disaster' would have been averted a million times over since then. The value of the Sydney Opera House is iconic, priceless and legendary.

[alpang]

My friend works for the acoustic consulting firm that designed the internal acoustics of the opera house. Apparently it was an absolute mess of a opera house to make it acoustically sound wbere the architect made it borderline impossible to make the internal sound of the opera hall sound acceptable

[jackson]

As an Australian who doesn't live in Sydney it is most definitely worth it. Iconic.

[vintageradio]

The Sydney Opera House was funded by a lottery which went on for many years after the facility was completed and open. Yes, it cost a lot, but no one person is really to blame for it. Today, it is Sydney's most visited tourist attraction.

[ronferguson]

Videos, photos, seeing it on television just doesn’t do it justice! When you see it for the first time, it’s absolutely breathtaking. I know that sounds ridiculous to say that about a building, but it really is! Words don’t really do it justice either!
As you enter Sydney Harbour, you’re greeted by the Opera House. Its beautiful white shells glistening in the sun, surrounded by the ocean blue waters of the harbour. As an Aussie, it really is something very special to me! 🇦🇺

[elroyfudbucker]

A few facts: The NSW state lottery paid for most of the construction, so it kind of was taxpayers money. It was built on the site of the old Bennelong point tram terminus. Utzon took inspiration from the inside of a walnut shell for the interior, which, although expensive, would probably have made for good acoustics.

[daveacbickford]

I'm happy to share that as a Sydneysider I've been fortunate enough to witness a few events and performances here and everything about the experience is just magical - not simply just the performances themselves with the acoustics that are an audio delight - but the visuals, from the stunning interior of the main hall to the fantastically retro fitout and hardware inside, the style is quite a product of its time and it's all the more enjoyable because of it, and on an emotional level it represents an Australia and a Sydney that was growing in leaps and bounds, even if that time is well before I was born, it's still so easy to appreciate it.
A must visit for anyone visiting our City 😊😊🇦🇺

[MrDan]

As a general rule, projects like this rarely get done under budget and almost always blow past the budget by a mile.

[SupremeLeaderKimJong-un]

inda like how the Louvre Pyramid became a Parisian icon despite being ridiculed at first! The Grand Louvre project was announced in 1981 by François Mitterrand, then President of France. In 1983 the Chinese-American architect I. M. Pei was selected as its architect. Besides this, Pei also designed pyramids for Cleveland's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the East Building of DC's National Gallery of Art. The pyramid completed in 1989 was initially designed by Pei in late 1983 and presented to the public in early 1984. The pyramid and the underground lobby beneath it were created because of deficiencies with the Louvre's earlier layout, which could no longer handle the increasing number of visitors on an everyday basis.

The construction of the pyramid triggered many years of lively aesthetic and political debate, stating the modernist style is inconsistent with the classic French Renaissance style, the pyramid being an unsuitable symbol of death from ancient Egypt, the project being megalomaniacal folly imposed by François Mitterrand, and saying a non-French guy like IM Pei shouldn't have been trusted with updating a treasured French landmark. On top of this, there was a myth that the pyramid purposefully had 666 panes despite the official number of panes being 673. Designed to handle 4.5 million visitors a year, the pyramid eventually proved inadequate and it was renovated in 2014.

[AverytheCubanAmerican]

Reminds me how the Guggenheim Museum by Frank Lloyd Wright in NYC faced just as harsh criticism and difficulties before being viewed as the NYC icon that it is today. When plans were first unveiled for the building, they were highly controversial among artists. Many felt that the curved walls of the building weren’t appropriate for displaying art, and this prompted 21 artists to send a letter to the director of the museum asking them to reconsider their plans. Besides this, the building's construction was delayed, first because of WWII material shortages, then by increasing construction costs after the war. By late 1946, Guggenheim and Hilla von Rebay had redesigned the basement theater to accommodate concerts.

Rebay and Wright disagreed over several aspects such as how the paintings were to be mounted. Solomon Guggenheim's health was in decline, but he refused Wright's offer to downsize so it could be completed during Guggenheim's lifetime. After Solomon died in 1949, members of the Guggenheim family had personal and philosophical differences with Rebay. Then the collection grew, and Wright had to redesign it again as a multi-story annex to incorporate a remodel of an apartment building they acquired (though this annex wasn't realized until the 1990s). Then James Johnson Sweeney became museum director in 1952, and he had a strained relationship with Wright because of the museum's lighting and color scheme (originally it was brownish yellow). Wright passed in April 1959, and the museum opened six months after.

[pedroperez]

So they lost a great financial opera-tunity

[OzMate]

I’ve heard stories of blokes working on the opera house, coming into work and clocking on then going to the pub for the day then clocking off and going home. I think it took an engineering team come in to start getting stuff done.

[cinemaipswich]

Build it and they will come. This is one example that it was true. Show a picture of it to some remote village, and they will recognise it. If you look at the shells you will notice that there are 14 forms that make up all the roof structure. Once the Australian engineers started to understand this unique structure, even they said Utson was a genius.