Perth

It’s been seven years since I last visited Perth, and while there are more flash buildings and more obvious wealth around, there are also definitely more people living on the streets, as the boom times come to an end. As a tourist though it was a more enjoyable place to explore than I remembered, in particular the architecture and heritage buildings. The Council House was one of my favourite buildings, particularly with bronze kangaroos in the foreground.

The incoming storm brought out interesting reflections in the many glass and steel towers looming behind heritage buildings, seems to be a common Perth thing to retain the heritage on the street and build a skyscraper behind it.

The new Woodside building in particular looked good from a variety of angles.

The views from King’s Park toward the CBD and across the Swan River were one of the few things I remembered (and the canyon of tall buildings along St George’s Terrace).

Somehow I’d forgotten about the scenically located war memorial in King’s Park.

There were also some colourful flower beds.

The Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts was worth a quick free visit, though as with most contemporary art galleries I enjoyed the building more than the art work.

The Art Gallery of Western Australia had art more to my liking, with a nice series of paintings by Stanley Spencer, a Henry Moore bronze, atmospheric photography, and an impressive set of paintings of a burnt forest. Unfortunately I was there a day early for their Heath Ledger show which would have been fascinating. The small art world was illustrated by their Corsini show starting in January, fresh from it’s current showing at Auckland Art Gallery. St Johns Lutheran Church was a little gem by the university.

This was one of the funkier visitor information centres I’ve come across.

There were a lot more heritage buildings than I remembered, though it’s more likely that I have a greater interest in them these days, illustrated by the rather sizeable number of photos I took, including of upmarket shops, His Majesty’s Theatre and Barracks Arch.