Discover Australia’s lesser-known Brutalist architecture with a guide to the raw concrete wonders of Sydney and its suburbs
“In giving physical form during the last vestiges of architectural modernism, Sydney’s Brutalism, which finished late by international standards, manifested in a variety of building types for a confident Pacific-rim city,” writes Sydney-based architect and urban designer Glenn Harper in his introduction to the Sydney Brutalist Map. Harper has a passion for Australia’s lesser-known Brutalism and since receiving a travelling scholarship for his Sydney Brutalist Project, has recently collaborated with independent map publishers Blue Crow Media to create an architectural map of the city, which also includes his own photographs.
“Having a direct and truthful exposure of material in either béton brut finish, precast concrete or textured brickwork, the uniqueness of Sydney’s Brutalism responded to a city of distinct topographic and urban character,” Harper explains. “With the first Brutalist buildings dating to the early 1960s and being houses within steep ‘bushland’ settings or educational buildings within new university campuses, the later projects of the 1980s were monumental and distinctly civic.”
Sydney is the latest city spotlighted in a series of Brutalist maps, joining London, Paris and Washington. The map features 50 of the most inspiring examples of Brutalist architecture in Sydney and its suburbs, from Pennant Hills to Sutherland and Curl Curl to Penrith.
The Brutalist Sydney Map is out now
Photography by Glenn Harper