What would our national capital city be like if it were designed today?
Some of the world’s most imaginative and talented city designers – including architects, artists, urban planners and students – have tackled these questions by entering CAPITheticAL, the Centenary of Canberra competition to design a hypothetical modern capital city.
The exhibition CAPITheticAL opens at the Gallery of Australian Design on 6 March 2013 and winners will be announced on 14 March.
One hundred years ago the city of Canberra was a dream, a national capital of the future. The guiding principle of ‘one people, one destiny’ as Henry Parkes advocated, was to be symbolised in the design of this new city, planned by American architects Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahoney. The couple’s design, selected as the best from an international competition, was intended as an ideal city, one that responded to the concerns of the time.
One hundred years later, times have changed. Questions of sustainability, liveability, transport and climate change challenge the way we live today and must influence plans for the future. In the exhibition CAPITheticAL a new generation of town planners, urban designers, architects and students consider how Canberra might be extended and modified to accommodate the pressures and concerns of the future or even if a new capital should be created.
To mark the Centenary of Canberra, a competition to design a hypothetical modern capital city for the next century was launched and more than 1200 practitioners registered their interest with entries received from 24 different countries. Only 20 finalists were chosen presenting a rich trove of ideas, both fantastical and practical, to provoke, amuse and ultimately delight visitors to the exhibition. Using plans, videos and drawings, each designer’s vision for the city of the future offers imaginative resolutions to questions of national symbolism and identity, access to government, sustainable development and community building for the year 2113.
CAPITheticAL opens at the Gallery of Australian Design on 6 March 2013 and winners will be announced on 14 March, sharing prizes worth up to $100,000. First prize is valued at up to $70,000.
Come and see the future!
Gallery of Australian Design, Parkes Place, Parkes
Dates : 6 March -11 May 2013
Gallery open wed – sat | 10am – 4pm
Sunday/public holidays | closed
Admission is free
CAPITheticAL is a Centenary of Canberra project, proudly supported by the ACT Government and the Australian Government, administered by the Australian Institute of Architects and presented as a Gallery of Australian Design exhibition.
For more information on CAPITheticAL
View the shortlisted entrants’ biographies
Calendar of other events
Background to The Centenary of Canberra, a word from the Creative Director, Robyn Archer
