arCHitECT -jORn utZOn
Swaraj singh baghel
B.Arch IV Year
En No. 071034
LifE anD caREer
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Utzon was born in Copenhagen, the son of a naval
engineer, and grew up in Denmark. From 1937 he
attended the Royal Danish Academy of Fine
Arts where he studied under Kay Fisker and Steen
Eiler Rasmussen. After graduating in 1942, he went
to Sweden to work for Gunnar Asplund. After the
end of World War II and the German Occupation of
Denmark, he returned to Copenhagen. In 1946 he
visited Alvar Aalto in Helsinki. From 1947–48 he
travelled in Europe in 1949 in the United
States and Mexico. In America he attended Frank
Lloyd Wright's school in Arizona. In 1950 he
established his own studio in Copenhagen.
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A Few Works……
prITzKEr prIZe fOR sYDneY OPERA
HOUSE…..
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In 1957 he unexpectedly won the competition to design
the Sydney Opera House. Although he had won six other
architectural competitions previously, the Opera House was his
first non-domestic project. The designs he submitted were also
little more than preliminary drawings. One of the judges,Eero
Saarinen, described it as "genius" and declared he could not
endorse any other choice.
Utzon refined his original conceptual designs for the shells over
several years. One particular difficulty was that the Cahill
government was so eager to commence the project that they
arranged for the engineers, Ove Arup and Partners, to put out
tenders for the podium without adequate working drawings; this
work actually began in 1959 while Utzon was still in Denmark
working on the final plans.
CONCEPT
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The extraordinary structure
of the shells themselves
represented a puzzle for the
engineers. This was not
resolved until 1961, when
Utzon himself finally came
up with the solution. He
replaced the original
elliptical shells with a design
based on complex sections
of a sphere. Utzon says his
design was inspired by the
simple act of peeling an
orange: the 14 shells of the
building, if combined, would
form a perfect
sphere. Although Utzon had
spectacular, innovative plans
for the interior of these halls
DeSCrIPtiON…..
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he Sydney Opera House is a modern expressionist design, with a series of large precast concrete
"shells", each composed of sections of a sphere of 75.2 metre (246 ft 8½ in) radius , forming the
roofs of the structure, set on a monumental podium. The building covers 1.8 hectares (4.5 acres)
of land and is 183 metres (605 ft) long and 120 metres (388 ft) wide at its widest point. It is
supported on 588 concrete piers sunk as much as 25 metres below sea level.
Although the roof structures of the Sydney Opera House are commonly referred to as "shells" (as
they are in this article), they are in fact not shells in a strictly structural sense, but are
instead precast concrete panels supported by precast concrete ribs.The shells are covered in a
subtle chevron pattern with 1,056,006 glossy white- and matte-cream-coloured Swedish-made
tiles from Höganäs AB,though, from a distance, the shells appear a uniform white.
Apart from the tile of the shells and the glass curtain walls of the foyer spaces, the building's
exterior is largely clad with aggregate panels composed of pink granite quarried in Tarana.
Significant interior surface treatments also include off-form concrete, Australian white
birch plywood supplied from Wauchope in northern New South Wales, and brush box glulam
Of the two larger spaces, the Concert Hall is located within the western group of shells, and the
Opera Theatre within the eastern group. The scale of the shells was chosen to reflect the internal
height requirements, with low entrance spaces, rising over the seating areas and up to the high
stage towers. The smaller venues (the Drama Theatre, the Playhouse, and The Studio) are
located within the podium, beneath the Concert Hall. A smaller group of shells set to the western
side of the Monumental Steps houses the Bennelong Restaurant. The podium is surrounded by
substantial open public spaces, of which the large stone-paved forecourt area with the adjacent
monumental steps is also regularly used as a performance space.
drAWinGs...biRD eyE viEW
sITe PLaN..AnD hoW tO reACh
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The Sydney Opera House was
made a UNESCO World Heritage
Site on 28 June 2007. It is one of
the 20th century's most distinctive
buildings and one of the most
famous performing arts centres in
the world.
The Sydney Opera House is
situated on Bennelong
Point in Sydney Harbour, close to
the Sydney Harbour Bridge. It sits
at the northeastern tip of
the Sydney central business
district (the CBD), surrounded on
three sides by the harbour (Sydney
Cove and Farm Cove) and
neighboured by the Royal Botanic
Gardens.
pLAns….
elEVaTIon….
scIOgrAPHy….
sECtioNS…….
3-D viEw…
Performance venues and facilities
inside the opera house…
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The Opera House houses the following performance venues:
The Concert Hall, with 2,678 seats, is the home of the Sydney Symphony and used by a large
number of other concert presenters. It contains the Sydney Opera House Grand Organ, the
largest mechanical tracker action organ in the world, with over 10,000 pipes.
The Opera Theatre, a proscenium theatre with 1,507 seats, is the Sydney home of Opera
Australia and The Australian Ballet.
The Drama Theatre, a proscenium theatre with 544 seats, is used by the Sydney Theatre
Company and other dance and theatrical presenters.
The Playhouse, an end-stage theatre with 398 seats.
The Studio, a flexible space with a maximum capacity of 400 people, depending on
configuration.
The Utzon Room, a small multi-purpose venue, seating up to 210.
The Forecourt, a flexible open-air venue with a wide range of configuration options, including
the possibility of utilising the Monumental Steps as audience seating, used for a range of
community events and major outdoor performances.
Other areas (for example the northern and western foyers) are also used for performances on
an occasional basis. Venues at the Sydney Opera House are also used for conferences,
ceremonies, and social functions.
CONSTRUCTION
HISTORY
orIGinS…..
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Planning for the Sydney Opera House began in the late
1940s, when Eugene Goossens, the Director of the NSW
State Conservatorium of Music, lobbied for a suitable venue
for large theatrical productions. The normal venue for such
productions, theSydney Town Hall, was not considered large
enough. By 1954, Goossens succeeded in gaining the
support of NSW Premier Joseph Cahill, who called for
designs for a dedicated opera house. It was also Goossens
who insisted that Bennelong Point be the site for the Opera
House. Cahill had wanted it to be on or near Wynyard
Railway Station in the northwest of the CBD.
A design competition was launched by Cahill on 13
September 1955 and received 233 entries, representing
architects from 32 countries. The criteria specified a large
hall seating 3000 and a small hall for 1200 people, each to
be designed for different uses, including full-scale operas,
orchestral and choral concerts, mass meetings, lectures,
ballet performances and other presentations.The winner,
announced in 1957, was Jørn Utzon, a Danish architect.
According to legend the Utzon design was rescued from a
final cut of 30 "rejects" by the noted Finnish architect Eero
Saarinen. The prize was £5,000. Utzon visited Sydney in
1957 to help supervise the project. His office moved to
Sydney in February 1963.
deSIgN n COnstRUcTIon…
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Stage I: Podium
Stage I commenced on 2 March 1959 by the construction firm Civil &
Civic, monitored by the engineers Ove Arup and Partners. The
government had pushed for work to begin early, fearing that funding,
or public opinion, might turn against them. However, Utzon had still not
completed the final designs. Major structural issues still remained
unresolved. By 23 January 1961, work was running 47 weeks
behind, mainly because of unexpected difficulties (inclement weather,
unexpected difficulty diverting stormwater, construction beginning
before proper construction drawings had been prepared, changes of
original contract documents). Work on the podium was finally
completed in February 1963. The forced early start led to significant
later problems, not least of which was the fact that the podium
columns were not strong enough to support the roof structure, and had
to be re-built.
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Stage II: Roof
The shells of the competition entry were originally of
undefined geometry, but, early in the design process,
the "shells" were perceived as a series
of parabolas supported by precast concrete ribs.
However, engineers Ove Arup and Partners were
unable to find an acceptable solution to constructing
them. The formwork for using in-situ concrete would
have been prohibitively expensive, but, because there
was no repetition in any of the roof forms, the
construction of precast concrete for each individual
section would possibly have been even more
expensive.
inTEriORs…..
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The major hall, which was originally to be a multipurpose
opera/concert hall, became solely a concert hall, called the Concert
Hall. The minor hall, originally for stage productions only, had the
added function of opera and ballet to deal with and is called the Opera
Theatre. As a result, the Opera Theatre is inadequate to stage largescale opera and ballet. A theatre, a cinema and a library were also
added. These were later changed to two live drama theatres and a
smaller theatre "in the round". These now comprise the Drama
Theatre, the Playhouse, and the Studio, respectively. These changes
were primarily because of inadequacies in the original competition
brief, which did not make it adequately clear how the Opera House
was to be used. The layout of the interiors was changed, and the stage
machinery, already designed and fitted inside the major hall, was
pulled out and largely thrown away.
Externally, the cladding to the podium and the paving (the podium was
originally not to be clad down to the water, but to be left open).
inTEriORs…..
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The construction of the glass walls (Utzon was planning to
use a system of prefabricated plywood mullions, but a
different system was designed to deal with the glass).
Utzon's plywood corridor designs, and his acoustic and
seating designs for the interior of both major halls, were
scrapped completely. His design for the Concert Hall was
rejected as it only seated 2000, which was considered
insufficient. Utzon employed the acoustic consultant Lothar
Cremer, and his designs for the major halls were later
modelled and found to be very good. The subsequent Todd,
Hall and Littlemore versions of both major halls have some
problems with acoustics, particularly for the performing
musicians. The orchestra pit in the Opera Theatre is
cramped and dangerous to musicians' hearing. The
Concert Hall has a very high roof, leading to a lack of early
reflections onstage—perspex rings (the "acoustic clouds")
hanging over the stage were added shortly before opening
in an (unsuccessful) attempt to address this problem
Few pictures of the opera house….
deATh….
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The Danish architect of the iconic Sydney Opera
House, Jorn Utzon, died at the age of 90in the year
2008(29th nov).
Utzon succumbed to a heart attack, while asleep at
home in Denmark on Saturday.
He was surrounded by family and had been ill for
some time.
He had not been doing well these past few days,
since Thursday. He had been undergoing a series of
operations .
Thank you…..
For being a patient audience