Perth-based building designer Shane O’Riley of Visionary Vanguard has caused quite a stir with his bold, spectacular design for a $1.2 billion Perth International Concert Hall & Cultural Centre, named The Arc, which he developed as an unsolicited proposal for the Elizabeth Quay redevelopment site on the banks of Perth’s iconic Swan River.

Considering the cost of building The Arc and the fact that the Elizabeth Quay project has already moved into delivery phase, with funding committed all major project approvals in place for an Aboriginal art and cultural area, it is unlikely that it will ever be built. But that hasn’t prevented the building, which some have likened to an echidna, but which also resembles a musical instrument, from becoming a major talking point.

According to Riley, the main objective of the project was to design a building for Perth that would rival the famous Sydney Opera House – an iconic, monumental sculptural object that draws inspiration from the Sydney Opera House’s beautiful waterside location, interacting with the Swan River like an organism depending on it for life.

The design of The Arc aims to draw people to the Elizabeth Quay site by extending the urban landscape to the water’s edge. O’Riley envisioned the building as an artefact on the landscape – a heroic and proud organic monument that respects and recognizes the indigenous heritage of the area, while at the same time focuses the visitors’ attention on the ceiling, the sky, and out on to the water.

Structurally, the main objective was to create a building where the exterior structural logic of the building is expressed in the interior. O’Riley imagines the experience of being inside the building as like being inside a living organism, an endoskeleton. “Put simply,” says O’Riley, “as soon as you enter the building, you are greeted with an inspirational architectural landscape, formal, bold, and surreal in its scope and audacity.”

O’Riley was inspired to explore this concept through to realization as a fully tested building at the virtual level by the Elizabeth Quay site as well as his travels around the world. “Just as the Eiffel Tower defined Paris, and Sydney is famous around the world by the Opera House, so Perth should be recognized with the proposed new International Concert Hall,” says O’Riley.

Although The Arc is likely to remain just a concept, O’Riley’s efforts have not been in vain. The proposal has emerged as a catalyst for important discussion and debate surrounding the role of iconic architectural statements in the development of a city’s identity. According to O'Riley, “It has also served as an inspiration to drive Perth forward.”