Canberra, ACT, Australia

The previously documented history of this unit (see the 091312 update to this page) initially placed it at the Building Materials Exhibition Center in Maryborough Street, Fyshwick around 1972. It then spent time on a private farm in Sutton and later moved to the Macquarie Slide Swimming Center (possibly painted red at that time). In 1997 it was relocated to the Dickson Canberra Planetarium site where it would remain until its final move in 2011 to its current location. The whereabouts of the uni

As we have often said on these pages we love black & white photography and we also love to see recent photos of Futuros. In this case we have a «double» with a great back and white shot of this Futuro posted to Instagram 102519 by canberrastreets; the same day (and the same poster but with a different Instagram account) canberrastreetscolour posted the second of the two photos below.

We recently received this collection of photos from Peter S.; they were taken in March 2018. The close up shots show a level of structural degradation that is perhaps a little surprising given how recently the unit was restored.

Issue 9 of the Australian publication Her Canberra included a fashion shoot which featured the Canberra University Futuro as a backdrop. The photos below can be found on the Devojka Models Facebook page and the video can be found on the Her Canberra website.

This video by Elucidating Conservation includes some great footage of this Futuro, both exterior and interior; it was added to YouTube 030817.

The 091312 update to this page included mention of this Futuro appearing at the Building Materials Exhibition Center in Maryborough Street, Fyshwick around 1972.

The photo below is of an advertisement from The Canberra Times dated 070172 which matches this exact location and timeframe thus confirming the earlier information. We came across this in a comment on a post on the Futuro House Facebook page. The original newspaper page can be found on trove.nla.gov.au

Finally got around to updating the address, lat/long and embedded Google Map to reflect the slightly different position of this Futuro on the university campus post its restoration; I believe the saying is «better late than never»!

We recently received an email from Daniel Soma in which he wrote:

«I am an artist from Sydney and am currently working on an exhibition (opening 041416) which is a case study of the failure of the Futuro home. It is an investigation of relational consequences that have naturally been undocumented which leave us with a clouded perception of «what went wrong». I find the Futuro home to be a wonderful catapult for this idea, and am consequently using its story for the show.»

As a part of his pre

The other day we came across this .pdf file from (based on the file name) 2011. The document, titled «We Come In Pieces — Conservation Problems Associated With The Futuro House At The University Of Canberra», is an academic paper by John Greenwood which provides a high level overview of the upcoming restoration project.

The document includes a section that provides a little general Futuro history and construction information, a short section on the history of this particular Futuro House (which

This week we received an email from Peter Bartlett with photographs of the restored Canberra University Futuro. Our thanks to Peter for sharing these photographs which can be seen below.

With the choice of exterior color this Futuro now reminds us a little of Futuro #001 located at the WeeGee Exhibition Center in Espoo, Finland; but that resemblance is only exterior. The interior shots show the choice to create a «new» interior for this Futuro rather than attempt to create an «original» interio

The photo below, an artist’s impression of the fully restored Futuro, accompanied a 032714 canberratimes.com.au article by Megan Doherty on the restoration project titled «Back to the futuro: iconic buildings headed to University of Canberra.» Not really any new information in the article but the artists impression is interesting; note that the exterior color appears to be very similar to that of the restored Futuro at the WeeGee Exhibition Center.

This week we received an update on the Futuro restoration project from Wade who is overseeing the project along with Jon. Thanks Wade — we appreciate it; it is interesting to follow the progress of a Futuro restoration as it happens.

The team is about three months into the project and Wade tells us activity so far includes the following:

Removal of the water-damaged chipboard structural elements in the lower segments and their replacement with structural grade plywood
Assembly of the lower ha

Wade & Jon who are overseeing the restoration of this Futuro recently reached out to us and offered to provide updates and photos during the course of their restoration project. We are really looking forward to seeing how things progress. In the meantime the photo below sent to us by Wade will serve as our «before» shot. Thanks Wade & Jon — we are really looking forward to following your progress as you work to return this Futuro to its former glory.

It seems the University of Canberra Futuro is finally going to get its major makeover. After being moved to the university campus and reassembled a couple of years ago the Futuro has remained largely unchanged. However in an article posted today on the Canberra Times website we learn that things are now moving along on the restoration front.

The Canberra Times article tells us that:

«After having spent the past two years in a relatively unkempt state at the university, the Futuro has now enter

A second Tim The Yowie Man blog post on canberratimes.com.au, this one dated 122112, recounts a little additional history relating to this Futuro. Our thanks to Yolande Norris who told us about the post.

The post is titled «Truth Is Out There» and in it John «Cooka» Campbell tells of a Futuro that could be found at 14 Currie Crescent, Kingston, ACT in the early 1970’s. Campbell is quoted in the article as follows:

«The white flying saucer was there when I moved into 14 Currie Crescent, Kingsto

We have updated the embedded Google Map for this Futuro since the Futuro now shows in Google Maps. Interestingly that imagery does not appear to show yet in Google Earth so we do not know the imagery date and Google has obviously not yet done another pass by with the camera van for «Street View» since the Futuro does not yet show up there either.

An 090712 blog post titled «Beam me up, UC» by Tim The Yowie Man on canberratimes.com.au that includes a couple of cool photos (below) also included s

Ok — so the observant ones among you will note that the Google Map does NOT show the Futuro — what’s the deal — is this project not supposed to be providing accurate data? Well we are unfortunately limited by the date of satellite imagery available in Google which currently shows this Futuro at its old location at the Canberra Planetarium — the Dickson Futuro. The date of imagery returned when looking up either location is 022908 — since the Futuro was relocated early 2011 the Google Map data sh