AN ICONIC STRUCTURE FOR BRISBANE

When discussion turns to buildings or structures that can be identified as
unmistakably “of Brisbane”,  it seems that we can find nothing better than the
“Fourex” sign on top of the Milton Brewery.

---

Brisbane tore down its potentially most representative icon  -” THE BIG “T”  in front of Toombul Shopping Centre – an accurate identifier of BrisVegas culture.

Unfortunately, all that remains is a sad caricature of it painted within a pastoral landscape on a power box in the footpath along Sandgate Road.

We definitely need some  grand scale imagery for Brisbane marketing types to work with.

40 years ago GA attended a conference in Sydney which included exhibits from an architectural student design competition for a monument to Captain Cook. The winner was the “Cookaroo” – a scheme by two second year students at Sydney University.

It is in the form of a giant kangaroo body topped with Cook’s head. The monument is three miles high, left foot on North Head, right foot on South Head with its tail on Middle Cove. The public was able to enter via two main “pawtals”.

The vision has as yet not been realized – but maybe we could appropriate it and adapt it to Brisbane’s geography – one paw on Moreton Island, one on North Stradbroke, pouch over the South Passage, and tail resting on the mud flats at Lota.