Abstract

Gold Coast high-rises are big and tall and sometimes they appear or are made to appear bigger and taller than they really are. They also loom large in other ways. They are part of the fabric and fantasy of the Gold Coast. They are its supreme icons. Only nine per cent of the permanent population lives in high-rises and the canal estates have considerable local cachet and appeal. Yet the city turns to its high-rises not only to promote itself to the rest of the world, but also to hold its own self-image: the Gold Coast City Council sponsors a ‘heritage’ architectural guide to tall buildings on the Gold Coast; the Gold Coast Bulletin constantly features articles on new high-rise plans and developments, high-rise architects, builders and developers, and high-rise residents. No-one seems to complain about views being obscured, at least publicly, and the shadows-on-the-beach argument, once a talking point, has been abandoned—in resignation, perhaps.

Highlights

  • ‘Would you ever tire of this view?’ I ask Aunty Enid who, with Uncle Jack, has holidayed on the Gold Coast almost every year since 1947 when they spent their honeymoon at the old Surfers Paradise hotel

  • We’re in her tenth-floor holiday apartment at Coolangatta looking eastward through the closed picture window at an expanse of blue intersected by the horizon and the railing of the ‘wrap-around’ balcony

  • Where I’m standing I can just see the tops of the Norfolk pines

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Summary

Introduction

‘Would you ever tire of this view?’ I ask Aunty Enid who, with Uncle Jack, has holidayed on the Gold Coast almost every year since 1947 when they spent their honeymoon at the old Surfers Paradise hotel.

Results
Conclusion

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