Old Parliament House Canberra. Now a great museum, gallery and gardens.

Old Parliament House, Canberra

The need for a national capital city arose when the col­onies united to form the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901. The new Australian capital city of Can­berra would soon grow, but Parl­iament couldn’t relocate from Melbourne until the pro­visional building in Can­berra was ready.

Scottish John Smith Murdoch (1862–1945), first Common­wealth Government archit­ect here, persuaded archit­ect Walter Bur­ley Griffin to come from the USA in 1913.

Parliament House was designed by Murdoch and a team of assist­ants from the Department of Works and Railways. The building was never int­ended to be permanent or elaborate; it was to be a provisional building that would serve Parliament for 50 years max. It would be a classical building like the Parthenon, but with­out all the ornate details. And it was to look out over Lake Burley Griffin.

Murdoch designed both the exterior of the building and the int­er­iors. He had to integrate all the spaces required of a parliament including: chambers, King’s Hall, party rooms, library, offices, members’ dining rooms and kit­chens. And he designed a distinctive set of furniture that shared the architecture’s design language.

So Murdoch’s provisional parliament building was to be modest, funct­ional and impermanent. It was designed on a basic square which provided the building with regular pro­p­or­t­ions. It was a 3-storey brick building with the principal floor on the middle level, and the funct­ional aspect was reflected in all the des­ign.

The faç­ade orig­inally included a grid of recessed openings and bal­con­ies, with four bays having arched bronze windows and stepped pa­r­apets. The façade had strong horizontal lines, display­ing only two storeys, with massed elements behind the faç­ade indicat­ing the loc­ation of the debating chambers. The lower mass in the centre was where King’s Hall was. As a result, with its now enclosed verandas and colonnades, the building was not what some Australians expected from a proper Par­liament House.

It did not include such cl­assical arch­itectural elements like col­umns or pedim­ents, but did have the necessary sym­metry. In the end, he had designed what is now considered a significant, nation­ally-listed heritage building with a fine sense of classical simp­licity, order and proportion.

The Duke and Duchess of York

opened Parliament in 1917

The building was in the Simplified or Strip­ped Classical Style, commonly used for Can­b­erra’s government build­ings built in the 1920s-1930s, and also recognisable in Murdoch’s other Can­ber­ra buildings eg the Hot­el Canberra/now Hyatt Hotel Canberra and Hotel Kurrajong. It was opened by the Duke and Duchess of York at the opening in May 1927.

When politicians arrived in Canberra for the opening of Provis­ion­al Parliament House in 1927, they saw bare ground and a low hedge, planted by the Superintendent of Parks and Gardens. The bush land­scape stood in stark contrast to the established lush gardens of the temporary Parliament in Melbour­ne. So from 1931-8, the Secret­ary of the Joint House Department started creating gardens to the east and west of Canberra’s Old Parliament House.

Old Parliament House's sig­nif­icance today lies in its hist­or­ic­al and social value to the nation. Now it is an important museum of Aust­ralia’s pol­itical heritage. Old Parl­iament House is open daily, for a guided tour or a self-tour where it’s possible to vis­it nearly all areas of the Old Parliament.

On the guided tour, see:
King's Hall,
House of Representatives Chamber,
Corridors of Power,
Ministerial Party Room,
Prime Ministers Office,
Cabinet Room,
National Portrait Gallery,
Senate Chamber,
Suite of the President of the Senate,
Senate Club Room,
House Gallery and
Strangers Gallery.

King's Hall

Senate chamber

Speaker's chair, oak, House of Representatives

Old Parliament House Canberra was the seat of the Parliament of Australia from 1927-88 . In the 61 years that the building served, there were changes in the size and nature of the Federal Parliam­ent eg in this time the House of Representatives grew from 76 to 148 members and the Senate from 36 to 76 members. In 1927, only the Speaker of the House, President of the Senate, Prime Minister, Leader of the Gov­ernment in the Senate and ministers had their own offices. Mean­while great changes were taking took place in Australian social and pol­itical life, and democracy matured.

During its life as a working parliament, the building was the set­ting for many of Australia’s major political events. Debates that influenced the future of the nation took place here, key decisions were taken, pol­itical careers were made and ended. But by the 1980s the building had exceeded its capacity with 3000 people crowded in­to a building originally intended for a few hun­dred. Members and senators had tiny and overcrowded offices.

In June 1988, members sat for the last time after 61 years in the old building, just as Parliament moved to the New Par­l­iament House on Capital Hill. Then Old Parliament House became home to The Nat­ional Por­trait Gallery which holds a variety of changing exhibit­ions. And it serves as a venue for temporary exhibitions, lectures and con­certs. In May 2008 King’s Hall became the Museum of Austral­ian Democracy. The museum tells the herit­age of the building and the story of Australia’s democracy.

Located on either side of Old Parliament House are the House of Representatives Garden and Senate Garden. The roses in this garden were planted during the Great Depression, and when Parliament mov­ed, the old gardens were restored to their former glory and opened to the public. New features included seating pavilions, pergolas, rose arbours, gateways and refurbished tennis courts.

 The old gardens have been restored and new facilities opened

The Hall of Valour recognises the heroic deeds of ordinary Australians in war.

Photo credits: Mildenhall images of Old Parliament House