New main entrance opens Memorial’s heart to Australians
The Main Entrance of the Australian War Memorial has officially been opened.
Sitting underneath the existing Commemorative Entrance of the 84-year-old building, the new space allows for weatherproof and safe access to the Memorial for all visitors. It is also a key stage in enabling the Memorial to be more accessible to more visitors in the decades ahead.
At the centre of the Main Entrance is the striking glass and steel Oculus, which floods the space with daylight, and through which visitors can glimpse the copper dome above the Hall of Memory. A mathematical inversion of the Memorial’s dome, the Oculus – which is Latin for “eye” – complements the heritage values of the original building.
Cast into the floor beneath the Oculus are the 15 qualities displayed in the stained glass windows in the Hall of Memory, at the heart of the Memorial.
The display installed in the Main Entrance is dedicated to Captain Reginald Saunders, the first Australian Aboriginal commissioned officer in the Australian Army. Born a member of the Gunditjmara people, Captain Saunders served in the Second World War and the Korean War.
Suspended above the new spiral stairs on the eastern and western sides of the concourse is a pair of shimmering glass installations created by internationally renowned artist Annette Blair at Canberra Glassworks. Blair’s artworks, Quiet skies, as the sun rises and Quiet skies, as the sun sets comprise 2 sculptures, each made of about 900 glass eucalypt leaves in colours redolent of sunrise and sunset.
‘Inspired by the familiar words from the acclaimed Ode of Remembrance – “At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them” – this special glass work is an ode to the personal and collective sacrifices the Memorial commemorates,' said the Memorial’s Director, Matt Anderson.
The Main Entrance also provides access to the Memorial gift shop, a 245-seat theatre, and dedicated space for public and private functions.
Within the foyer is a multimedia large-scale display of the film, Places of Pride, featuring 42 war memorials from across the country that reflect the diversity of commemoration in Australia. The display also allows visitors to search for memorials in their home towns as a means of connecting a visit to the national War Memorial with their local places of pride.
Visitors can approach the Main Entrance from the east directly from the Poppy’s Café underground carpark, a glass lift or stairs, and from the west via a wide gently sloping path from the Sculpture Gardens.
One of the Memorial’s most beloved sculptures, Simpson and his donkey, 1915, was relocated to the eastern courtyard of the Main Entrance on 13 December 2024, ahead of the east entrance opening to the public later that month. The west entrance opened to the public in January.