From the
Australian National Maritime Museum website:
The Australian National Maritime Museum, on the western shore of Sydney's Darling Harbour, is in a lively heritage precinct with many attractions. The distinctive main building, with a roofline evoking waves and sails, houses exhibitions that:
- explore Australia's links with the sea
- consider how maritime activities and issues have shaped the lives of people in Australia.
These exhibitions are themed, ranging from Indigenous lore and European seafaring to aquatic sport and the maritime defence of our shores.
Wharf 7 Maritime Heritage Centre next door is the museum's 'backstage' area, housing the Vaughan Evans Library, museum collection storage, boatbuilding workshops, the conservation laboratory, ship model workshop and display area, a design studio, photographic studio and other facilities. Guided tours are available.
At our wharves, we have one of the largest fleets of any museum in the world. The 14 vessels include a former navy destroyer HMAS Vampire, a former navy submarine HMAS Onslow, a full-scale replica of Captain Cook's ship Endeavour and a variety of smaller vessels scaling down to an 8.6-metre couta fishing boat.
From the Sydney Architecture website:
The Australian National Maritime Museum, opened in 1991, was designed by Phillip Cox. The high walls and diving roof forms were designed to accommodate the masts of boats contained in the museum. The Museum also contains floating attractions including the ex-RAN Oberon class submarine Onslow, moored next to the Daring Class destroyer Vampire. Historic vessels visiting Sydney tie up here.
"The major NSW Bicentennial project for 1988 in Sydney was the Darling Harbour redevelopment. Cox's firm produced three major structures. Amid a veritable armada of tall buildings, the small, unusual, and exciting Sydney Aquarium looks like a beached whale or some prehistoric sea beast, shiny and full-scaled. It differs from all the other buildings in that it was a privately funded building and focuses on an activity below the water rather than on top! In fact it is part building, part barge. It has three sections: an earthbound display; an exhibition and visitor centre; and a restaurant. To its north are three floating and semi-submerged freely moving tanks in which an Oceanarium is situated, allowing spectators to walk literally through walkways surrounded by water, and varieties of sea life. The third structure, the Maritime Service Board Wharf No. 10, also to the north, houses the support services and labs. The tanks, looking like small barges or ships moored to the wharf are covered by fabric roofs hung from masts and steel cable, all of which further extend in terms of maritime metaphors. The sensation of walking in a boat rather than on hard land is an important feature of this enterprising exhibition." — Dennis Sharp. Twentieth Century Architecture: a Visual History. p398-9.