City Hall

The other day we all trekked to the city centre to visit the newly refurbished Brisbane City Hall. It was such a fantastic morning out and makes a great school holiday destination for those, like us, staying close to home for the September break.

Brisbane City Hall

We visited the re-opened Museum of Brisbane which is a fab space located on level 3 of the building. Admission is free and there is currently a walk-down-memory-lane exhibit of Expo '88 focusing on the daily lunch and night time light parades. I felt like I was 15 years old again wearing stone wash denim and and a bandanna around my wrist. Jason's only hazy memory of those six months of the World Exposition was of the Munich Festhaus...

The Museum has a very contemporary feel and is a nice juxtaposition to the neo-classical style of City Hall's architecture.

Museum of Brisbane sitting area

From level 3, you are also able to book a tour to the clock tower which we found out is the largest clock in Australia. Who knew? I hadn't been up to the clock tower for about 25 years, and Jason and the boys had never been. You are transported in the old cage lift, which was originally the maintenance/service lift, to the viewing platform where you get a lovely view of Brisbane. The tour runs at 15 minute intervals and the kids really loved it. Again, admission is free.

View from the City Hall clock tower. The curved building in the centre is by the modernist architect Harry Seidler who designed  the Hilton Hotel in 1986

I didn't realise that we needed to pre-book the actual city hall tour before we went, so we missed out on seeing the renovated building in all its glory.  We probably would've been pushing it given the attention span of a certain #3 Son, but we plan to go back to see more of one of Brisbane's most iconic civic building.

Vintage travel poster for Brisbane in the Museum