Chinese Colours and the Sydney doi:10.

1093/jdh/ept029
Journal of Design History

Opera House (1956–1966): Jørn Vol. 27 No. 3

Utzon’s Reinterpretation of
Traditional Chinese Architecture

Chiu Chen-Yu, Peter Myers and Philip Goad

Throughout his life, Danish architect Jørn Utzon (1918–2008) was obsessed with
traditional Chinese architecture, which played a crucial role in his colour schemes
for the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966). However, current scholarship has not yet
provided a detailed and rigorous discussion of Utzon’s deliberate analogies with
Chinese colours. This article seeks to clarify Utzon’s artistic debt to China, by closely
examining his colour proposals for the Sydney Opera House. Utzon’s Opera House
colours represent a unique matrix of cultural dissemination and transformation
between China, Scandinavia and Australia; a subtle manifestation of cross-cultural
influence and mastery of design within the history of modern architecture. This article
contributes to the potentially rich historiography on the relationship between Utzon’s
designs for the Sydney Opera House and his own growing understanding of traditional
Chinese architecture. We contend that traditional Chinese architecture functioned as
an impetus to confirm Utzon’s unique design convictions. The scope of this article is
to understand Utzon’s Sydney Opera House as a significant example of cross-cultural
dissemination and transformation between China, Scandinavia and Australia within the
history of modern architecture.

Keywords: architecture—China—colour—cultural interaction—cultural translation—East-

West—Jørn Utzon—the Sydney Opera House

Introduction
In his 2002 work Sydney Opera House: Utzon Design Principles, Danish architect Jørn
Utzon (1918–2008) republished his by now famous conceptual sketch, ‘Chinese houses
and temples’, to signal his future ‘vision’ for the Sydney Opera House [1].1 In this text,
Utzon acknowledges the importance of Oriental colours in his design of the Opera
House (1956–1966), particularly those used in traditional Chinese architecture: ‘[. . .]
I thought in a different way than the daily colour and when we meet for performances
we are together to be moved in our minds and in our soul and experience what comes
into our minds. And these colours would support that, and it would be oriental [. . .].’2

Further discussing his colour scheme for the acoustic ceilings of the Major Hall, Utzon
states: ‘[. . .] Look here [at Chinese buildings], these kinds of colours are very different
from outside, only inside you have it in the caves and in the temples colours which are
© The Author [2013]. Published by
always on the edge of being cream to yellow and red to orange.’3
Oxford University Press on behalf
of The Design History Society. All
This was not the first time Utzon acknowledged the significant role of Chinese building rights reserved.
culture in his designs for the Sydney Opera House. Utzon consistently confirmed his Advance Access publication 11
artistic debt to Chinese architecture before and after his departure from the project in December 2013

278
Fig 1.  Utzon’s now famous
conceptual sketch of ‘Chinese
houses and temples’ originally
published in his 1962 manifesto
‘Platforms and Plateaus: Ideas
of a Danish Architect’ (Zodiac,
vol. 10, 1962, p. 116), and later
republished as an indication of
his ‘vision’ of the Sydney Opera
House in J, Utzon, Sydney Opera
House: Utzon Design Principles,
The Sydney Opera House Trust,
Sydney, 2002. Reproduced with
permission from Jan Utzon

1966.4 Notwithstanding this, nearly a half century later the importance of ideas associ-
ated with traditional Chinese architecture remains largely unexplored in scholarly stud-
ies of Utzon’s Sydney Opera House.5

This article examines the colour schemes both of Utzon’s realized and unrealized pro-
posals for his Sydney project, and proposes a series of analogies between his perception
and reinterpretation of Chinese architecture in his own design work, especially Utzon’s
never realized interiors for his Opera House with their dominant ‘Chinese’ elements.
Three questions are pertinent to Utzon’s reinterpretation of Chinese colours. First, what
are the interpretations of China that stimulated Utzon’s appreciation of the colours
of traditional Chinese architecture? Second, how does Utzon reinterpret perceived
Chinese colours for his Sydney Opera House? Third, why did Utzon propose Chinese
colours for this project? These questions define our fundamental argument that Utzon
was not an obvious, romantic imitator of Chinese built forms. Rather, Utzon’s architec-
tural reinterpretation of Chinese building culture reflects a far more complex approach,
influenced by certain Chinese ideologies, buildings and artefacts that he encountered.

Accordingly, this article discusses particular interpretations of China and certain cross-
cultural contexts chronologically, according to Utzon’s study of traditional Chinese
architecture from his childhood to the late 1950s, particularly Jens Vilhelm Dahlerup’s
1874 Pantomime Theatre, Carl Petersen’s 1912 Faaborg Museum, the Danish Royal
Academy during the 1920s and 1930s, Osvald Sirén’s writings, Ragnar Östberg’s 1923
Stockholm Town Hall and, finally, Utzon’s own 1958 journey to China. These subjects
provide an insight into how Utzon’s life experiences, background and the zeitgeist
of the times cultivated his understanding of Chinese building culture. Each of these
subjects reveals a distinct impact on Utzon’s designs for the Sydney Opera House, by
proposing particular analogies between his perception and reinterpretation of Chinese
ideologies and artefacts. Each analogy will reveal Utzon’s design intentions for the
Sydney Opera House, by exploring his reasons for reinterpreting certain traditional
Chinese colours.

Chiu Chen-Yu, Philip Goad and Peter Myers

279
Jens Vilhelm Dahlerup’s Pantomime Theatre,
Copenhagen, 1874
Utzon travelled to China in 1958. However, before this once in a lifetime journey,
Utzon had already been much exposed in Denmark to various artefacts representative
of Chinese building culture. Utzon’s initial fascination with traditional Chinese archi-
tecture can be traced back to his childhood experience of Copenhagen’s Pantomime
Theatre, built in 1874 by Jens Vilhelm Dahlerup (1836–1907), in the Tivoli Gardens
established by Georg Carstensen (1812–1857) in 1843.6 Tivoli Gardens is a highlight
of Denmark’s nineteenth-century Orientalism; its opening coincided with Danish writer
Hans Christian Andersen’s (1805–1875) publication in the same year of The Nightingale
(1843), a fairy tale set in an ancient Chinese kingdom.7 With Chinese-inspired build-
ings including pavilions, a bazaar and a railway station, this fairy-tale kingdom at Tivoli
reflects the legacy of Nordic Chinoiserie in its transformation of earlier Danish Anglo-
Chinese gardens from the beginning of the industrial revolution.8 Tivoli Gardens suc-
cessfully combines eighteenth-century romanticism with a typically English picturesque
setting, which in turn embraces nineteenth-century liberal historicism in its architectural
expression. Achieving royal patronage and commercial success, in the late nineteenth
century Tivoli Gardens symbolized Denmark’s new national approach to exoticism and
mercantile capitalism and exemplified Denmark’s acceptance of Neo-Chinoiserie.9

Unlike contemporary Danish ‘Post-Classicism’, with its moderate historical references,

Dahlerup’s Pantomime Theatre endeavoured to attain a certain correctness, with its
application of a ‘Chinese Imperial’ style within the prevailing architectural manners of
‘International Historicism’ (1870–1890).10 With elaborate handicraft and polychrome
stucco decoration, Dahlerup’s theatre successfully interpreted and applied many sophis-
ticated and representative details of traditional (albeit from a range of historical eras)
Chinese architecture, including bracketing units, lattice work and roof decoration. The
‘Chinese’ colour composition of the Pantomime Theatre was credible enough to pass
for genuine, vividly representing a fictional classical Chinese monument with its formal
façade setting and decorative devices. Although Dahlerup never visited China, his Tivoli
masterpiece, with its Chinese Imperial red columns and gilded bronze roof details, was
designed using early photographs and published documents describing Imperial Beijing.11

The Pantomime Theatre, with its liberal use of dramatic Chinese colours and detailed
architectural features, combined a modern theatrical setting with ancient Chinese
metaphors. To a young Utzon, Dahlerup’s ‘Chinese’ Pantomime represented an ideal
modern theatre, with its carefully articulated exotica and festiveness, both of which
were crucial in Utzon’s later series of analogous Chinese colour combinations for his
Sydney Opera House.12 Confirming this proposition, brackets in red and gold contrast-
ing with black from Dahlerup’s 1874 Pantomime Theatre can also be seen in Utzon’s
1964–1965 study models of the acoustic ceilings, walls and black stage tower in his
projected designs for the Major Hall of the Sydney Opera House [2].

Utzon’s use of two Imperial colours—Chinese red and yellow gold leaf—for the Major
Hall of his Opera House was a direct design strategy to visually represent the faraway
and exotic phenomena of ancient China in a modern theatrical setting: ‘[. . .] The halls
will form another world—a make believe atmosphere, which will exclude all outside
impression and allow the patrons to be absorbed into the theatre mood [. . .].’13

Here, Utzon conceives ‘another world’ as essentially a resonance between the major audi-
toriums of his Sydney Opera House and some faraway Chinese kingdom. To Utzon, each of
his auditorium rooms comprises a ‘doubled’ exotica in which not only does the audience sit

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

280
Fig 2.  This model, constructed by Finecraft Scale Models, Sydney, shows Utzon’s final designs for the glass walls and the interior of the
Major Hall of his Sydney Opera House. Photos taken by Utzon’s chief assistant, Mogens Prip-Buus, on 18 March 1966. Prip-Buus wrote
to the authors on 26 June 2013: ‘The work on this second model—half the size of the first—was started long before the crisis and the
so-called resignation. As long as we still were in the site-office, I checked the work every morning and afternoon, even if we were no
more the architects of SOH. When it was near completion, the Usher brothers called me one day—it could have been March 18th 1966—
at the beginning of the afternoon asking me to come as soon as possible with my cameras, as the minister would send a lorry during
the afternoon to take the model away. I did so and took my photos and 8mm movie in an extreme hurry, as they could come at any
moment, and the quality suffered thus a bit. The model was taken away and disappeared entirely for a long time; I think it was around
20 years, until it was found in a basement somewhere. For the minister and his team this model was sort of dynamite, as they maintained
that Utzon had no drawings of the interiors and the glass walls, and the model showed clearly our project, based on drawings given to
Finecraft Models.’ Source: Mogens Prip-Buus’ collection. Reproduced with permission from Mogens Prip-Buus

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281
in front of ‘another world’ on the stage, but also, as with the experience of the Chinese out-
door arena in front of Dahlerup’s Pantomime Theatre, audience members symbolically enter
a certain territory with the auditorium itself as an exotic place: ‘[. . .] During intermission you
remain around the auditorium and can retain the feeling of being in another world [. . .]’.14

In addition to presenting exotica from ‘another world’, the vibrant Chinese colours of
both Dahlerup and Utzon demonstrate how these two architects offered enjoyment
and excitement by consciously creating a sense of festivity. Dahlerup’s creation of an
imaginative and humorous atmosphere within the prevailing Tivoli theme is recalled
in Utzon’s aim of achieving a ‘festival mood’ inside his Opera House through colour
expression: ‘[. . .] As you enter the Minor or Major Hall, this explodes into a very rich
expression of colours, which uplift you in that festival mood, away from daily life, that
you expect when you go to the theater, a play, an opera or a concert [. . .].’15

This retrospective statement, published in 2002, reflects Utzon’s 1956 competition pro-
posal: ‘The whole exterior [of the Opera House] radiates lightness and festivity [.  . .].’16
For Utzon, a building for the performing arts must present a mood of ‘festivity’ both inside
and outside, which reaches its culmination at the stage: ‘[. . .] So going to the Opera House
is a succession of visual and audio stimuli, which increase in intensity as you approach the
building, as you enter and finally sit down in the halls, culminating with the performance.’17

Consequently, Utzon’s colour scheme attains its aesthetic effect and humanistic ideals
by reflecting the cultural strength of nineteenth-century Danish Orientalism, as exem-
plified by the Tivoli Gardens generally and Dahlerup’s Pantomime Theatre in particular.
Utzon’s never-­completed Opera House could be seen as Australia’s own version of
Denmark’s Tivoli Gardens and as part of a revival and universalization of Chinoiserie
into the twenty-first century.

Carl Petersen’s Faaborg Museum, Denmark, 1912–1915

Utzon’s vibrant colours for the Major Hall of his Sydney Opera House were also influenced
by a Chinese-inspired peacock theme adopted for the mural in the Archives Room at the
Faaborg Museum (1912–1915), designed by the eminent Danish architect Carl Petersen
(1874–1923). As a professor at the Danish Royal Academy, and also as consultant archi-
tect to the Thorvaldsen Museum from 1919–1922, Petersen was crucial in shaping archi-
tectural culture in Denmark after the First World War. Utzon entered the Royal Academy in
1937 and he was certainly very familiar with Petersen’s masterpiece at Faaborg.18

Petersen’s work is generally placed within Nordic Neoclassicism. However, his Faaborg
Museum intentionally incorporates numerous Chinese motifs.19 For example, the
Faaborg’s peacock theme on a yellow ochre background within a Chinese Imperial red
and royal blue border directly recalls the Peacock decorated stage curtain at Dahlerup’s
Pantomime Theatre which, in turn, was certainly influenced by James McNeill Whistler’s
1876 Peacock Room20 painted for the London house of Frederick Leyland.21 Externally,
the projecting eaves and curved hip roof of the Faaborg Museum’s short façade force-
fully reinterprets the animated roof forms of earlier Nordic Chinoiserie. Petersen’s
Chinese-inspired forms are incorporated within an austere Neoclassicism of Doric
columns, rounded arches and white stucco walls. The Faaborg Museum represents a
muted combination of Danish Classicism and Orientalism, unlike the exaggerated fes-
tive character of Dahlerup’s Pantomime Theatre. In Denmark, by the early twentieth
century, Chinese architectural forms were being treated seriously as elements within a
modern classical vocabulary.

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

282
 One might question Petersen’s application of Chinese motifs in his Faaborg Museum
and other works.22 In his seminal 1909 essay, ‘Porcelæn’ (‘Porcelain’), Petersen criti-
cizes the ‘cultural collapse’ in Denmark since the end of the nineteenth century and
praises the glory of ancient China by extolling the artistic quality of Chinese porcelain
in the Danish National Museum’s extensive collection and comparing it to what he saw
as unsatisfying examples of contemporary Danish design.23 After some thirty years
of Japonism and Art Nouveau, to Petersen, there had been little progress in Danish
design,24 and he suggests that the closing stages of Japonism should have stimulated
another revival of Chinoiserie, thus regenerating a Danish national style through using
a dominant foreign stylistic influence.25 Later, in 1919, Petersen again upheld ‘ancient
China’ and its porcelain as an ideal of artistic creation, idolising China’s perfect expres-
sion of ‘design, colours, proportions and textural effect’.26 For Petersen, learning from
ancient China became a vehicle to stimulate a new Danish national style and, moreo-
ver, to celebrate his country’s long and intimate relationship with China.

The resonance between Petersen and Utzon, in terms of using Chinese-inspired colours
and themes in interior design, is not surprising. Like Petersen, Utzon was critical of pre-
vailing architectural trends in Denmark and elsewhere in Europe, and he also sought
new inspiration.27 Utzon’s intentions were clearly revealed in his 1947 manifesto,
‘Tendenser i Nutidens Arkitektur’ (‘Tendencies in present-day Architecture’), which he
wrote in collaboration with fellow Danish architect Tobias Faber (1915–2010):

[. . .] many [architects] are again sustaining themselves with tradition, with those
forms with which there had been a break well before functionalism. In favorable
circumstances this tradition becomes refined but in bad ones it merely reverts
to functionalism. Others try to carry functionalism further but are unable to do
so without ending up with formalistic results. One might call them motivists, in
that they assemble the form of their architecture out of motives torn loose from
their origins; motives with which they are infatuated. Their architecture becomes
unclear, just like a language without a grammar.28

In their manifesto, Utzon and Faber included four illustrations of Chinese buildings and
presented these examples as an ideal for a new architecture.29 Significantly, for Utzon,
traditional Chinese buildings were much more rewarding than Japanese architecture,
despite the fact that Japanese architecture was better known in Denmark at this time.30

Petersen’s motivation to work with Chinese design ideas, towards a regeneration of

Danish design culture during the First World War, is directly echoed in Utzon’s criti-
cal approach during his early architectural career after the Second World War, and
ultimately, in his colour schemes for the Sydney Opera House. To both Petersen and
Utzon, ancient China represented a classical correctness for Danish architectural design,
wherein Chinese built forms are an authorized exotica given their complex relationship
with Denmark’s national history and identity.

The Danish Royal Academy

When Utzon studied at Denmark’s Royal Academy between 1937 and 1942, there
was already a strong Danish interest in ancient Chinese architecture. Whilst there
was no formal academic teaching in this subject, several staff members had substan-
tial research interests in traditional Chinese art and architecture. Among these was
Utzon’s uncle, Aksel Einar Utzon-Frank (1888–1955), a noted sculptor and a professor,
who played a very significant role in both Utzon’s architectural career and early inter-
est in China. In Utzon-Frank’s studio, young Utzon encountered ‘many kinds of things’

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283
from China in his uncle’s large collection, including Imperial decorative roof tiles and
various ceremonial objects, paintings and masks.31 In parallel, Utzon-Frank’s collection
of Neo-Gothic sculptures, with their references to Greek and Nordic myths and exotic
cultures, proclaimed a certain Danish primitivism. No doubt Utzon-Frank’s collections
influenced Utzon’s approach to architectural design. To young Utzon, China was inte-
gral with his uncle’s exoticism and primitivism: ‘[. . .] my uncle Einar Utzon Frank let
me know the East, when I was young [. . .]’.32 Utzon’s eldest son, Jan Utzon (1944–),
explained: ‘My grand-uncle told my father to search for inspiration from the unknown
Eastern cultures, instead of the West with which we were more familiar.’33

Professor Kay Fisker (1893–1965), who taught Utzon at the Royal Academy, had been
granted a travelling scholarship in 1922 by the East Asiatic Company (EAC) to visit China
and Japan as a guest passenger on an EAC ship. After spending four months in China and
two months in Japan,34 in 1923, Fisker published his article, ‘Peking’, in Arkitekten, with
his own excellent photographs. Another Utzon mentor, Professor Steen Eiler Rasmussen
(1898–1990), published Billedbog fra en Kinarejse (Pictures from a Journey to China) in
1935 and its revision Rejse I Kina (Travel in China) in 1958, both of which exposed Utzon
to the special role of colour in Imperial Chinese architecture.35 Rasmussen’s apprecia-
tion of Chinese painted carpentry was vividly recorded in his later watercolour drawings
based on his 1923 photographs of Beijing’s Imperial monuments.36

In the same year as Rasmussen published Billedbog, 1935, a 1:20 scale model of a Qing
Dynasty (1644–1912) Chinese palace was installed at Copenhagen’s Royal Academy.
This model, commissioned by Danish missionary architect Johannes Prip-Møller (1889–
1943), was funded by the New Carlsberg Foundation in 1933.37 This two metre long
timber model was made in Beijing by the Society for Research in Chinese Architecture,
under Professor Liang Sicheng (1901–1972).38 Due to budget constraints, the interior
was not painted; however, the model’s vibrant exterior colours had a radical impact on
Utzon’s early perception of Chinese architecture.39 Juxtaposed against glazed yellow
for the roof and red for structural carpentry, the model’s green/blue bracketing sub-
structure comprehensively represented a surviving decorative painting style known as
Xuanzi caihui (旋子彩繪 [Flowery Painting Style]). These Imperial colours and their pat-
terns further stimulated Utzon’s interest in Chinese buildings, and ultimately led him to
China in 1958 where he subsequently met Professor Liang in Beijing. Moreover, Utzon’s
study of Prip-Møller’s monumental work—Chinese Buddhist Monasteries (1937)—
resulted in his visiting several important monasteries during this trip.40

In Denmark, the New Carlsberg Foundation had previously assisted in establishing both
the Museum of National History (Nationalmuseet) in 1878 and Museum of Decorative
Art (Kunstindustrimuseet) in 1895. The Nationalmuseet subsequently documented, col-
lected and published the archives of the Danish Monarchy’s relationship with China: this
project was politically very beneficial for the relationship between Denmark and China.41
The Kunstindustrimuseet also started a significant collection of traditional Chinese arts
and crafts, as well as Chinoiserie, neo-Chinoiserie, Japonism and French Art Nouveau.
As these important collections were available to the Danish public, we can safely assume
that they too significantly influenced Utzon’s own interest in China and things Chinese.42

Osvald Sirén, scholar

After graduating in 1942, Utzon continued his study of the available literature on
Chinese architecture, much of which was written by the art historian Osvald Sirén
(1869–1966). Sirén was a significant, influential and extremely productive historian

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

284
 of traditional Chinese art, architecture, gardens and
paintings.43 Utzon owned many of Sirén’s publica-
tions, some of which still remain in the possession of
Utzon’s family. Utzon started to study Sirén’s oeuvre
while working as an architect in Stockholm following
Denmark’s occupation by Nazi Germany.44 Utzon’s pas-
sion for Sirén’s scholarship can be partly explained by
his cultural sympathy and empathy for China, as China
was fighting against Japan, one of Nazi Germany’s
allies. Significantly, Utzon now considered traditional
Japanese architecture as ‘degenerate’.45

Most of Sirén’s early writings were monographs with

monochromatic prints. The Walls and Gates of Peking
(1924) was his first study that included coloured
drawings; two images vividly depicted the inner and
outer Yongdingmen (永定門 [The Gate of Eternity])
gate towers in old Beijing.46 Notably, Utzon repro-
duced a Sirén photograph of the Yongdingmen in
his 1947 ‘Tendenser’ manifesto and praised this ‘[. . .]
Chinese wall, whose individual strength is so great that,
even the highly-detailed tower is controlled by the wall,
and the tower adapts and enriches the whole.’47 Sirén’s
representation of the Yongdingmen was important to
Utzon’s early perception of Chinese urban traditions,
and this particular structure was to become symbolic in
Utzon’s representation of Chinese architecture.

The Yongdingmen inspired Utzon to make a series of

formal analogies within his Sydney Opera House. Thus,
the juxtaposition between the white shells and stone-
faced podium of Utzon’s Opera House, as presented in
Fig 3.  Above: Illustration of his own photographs, directly refers to the combina-
the Yongdingmen from O. Sirén, tion between the ash grey roofs and city walls of the Yongdingmen [3]. The peninsula-
The Walls and Gates of Peking,
like site of the Yongdingmen was for Utzon an important formal analogy to Sydney’s
William Clowes & Sons, London,
1924, unpaginated, in T. Faber & Harbour and Bennelong Point, where his great work is located. Utzon transformed the
J. Utzon, ‘Tendenser i Nutidens massive wall and U-shaped enclosure of the Yongdingmen into the two curved outlines
Arkitektur’, Arkitekten, vols. of the northern podium. Utzon’s podium has sandstone cladding in his 1956 competition
7–9, 1947. Below: photograph design; this surely is an interpretation of Sirén’s images of Chinese city walls, and defines
of an early model of the Sydney
an enormous plateau.48 Subsequently, Utzon proposed the movable red glass mullions
Opera House, taken by Utzon
during 1957–1958, from the between his shell/podium juxtaposition, as illustrated in his 1958 Sydney National Opera
Utzon Archive. Reproduced with House (Red Book) [4].49 Utzon’s mullions echoed the painted structural carpentry of the
permission from Jan Utzon Yongdingmen and other Imperial buildings. These analogies with the Yongdingmen both
aligned and affirmed the monumentality of Utzon’s Opera House at Sydney, a harbour
city which his now constructed ‘walls’ and ‘gate towers’ so proudly represent and guard.

Ragnar Östberg’s Stockholm Town Hall, 1923

Surprisingly, Osvald Sirén’s publications on traditional Chinese art and architecture
affirmed the strength of Sweden’s National Romanticism as a response to a growing
nationalism between the two World Wars. This movement culturally explored and

Chiu Chen-Yu, Philip Goad and Peter Myers

285
expropriated certain Chinese artefacts to confirm Sweden’s
emerging national identity within the international commu-
nity.50 In the early twentieth century, Stockholm was the centre
of Chinese archaeology in the West, and Utzon’s friend Tobias
Faber, who was in Stockholm with Utzon during the Second
World War, recalls: ‘Compared with Sweden, Denmark was
relatively isolated at that time. So, in Stockholm, Utzon and
I discovered more China together!’51

Other pioneers of Sweden’s cultural exploration of ancient

China also indirectly influenced Utzon at this time. Sven Hedin
(1865–1952), the Central Asian explorer and cartographer,
was a founder of the Swedish Museum of Ethnography, which
Utzon and Faber frequented during their time in Stockholm.52
Inspired by Hedin’s journeys, the noted geologist, palaeon-
tologist and archaeologist Johan Gunnar Andersson (1874–
1960) began his studies of Chinese archaeology in the 1920s.
An important collection of objects from prehistoric East Asia
discovered by Andersson in 1926 became the founding col-
lection of the Swedish Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities
(Östasiatiska Museet). Andersson was the first Director of the
Östasiatiska Museet, and Utzon and Faber studied the mate-
rial in this museum.53 The second Director, Bernhard Karlgren
(1889–1978), was an important and famous sinologist and
philologist, who contributed much to Swedish scholarship
on China. Utzon’s close friend, the famous sinologist, Else
Glahn (1921–2011), was a student of Karlgren at Stockholm
University from 1949–1957 and later became a pioneering
scholar who helped to decode the Yingzao fashi (營造法式
[State Building Standards]), first published in AD 1103.54
Glahn’s erudite work on China was to provide her friend Utzon
with a most discerning view of its art and architecture.55

Crucially, Sirén was in charge of the Far Eastern Collection

within the Department of Painting and Sculpture at The
National Museum in Stockholm (1928–1945).56 Utzon and
Faber not only haunted the National Museum, they also con-
trived to meet Sirén in Copenhagen soon after the war, in
Fig 4.  Above: ‘Yung Ting Men
their quest for enlightenment about traditional Chinese art (the Yongdingmen), elevation
and architecture.57 of the inner tower’, from
O. Sirén, The Walls and Gates of
Sweden’s empathy with China in the early twentieth century was also reflected in Peking, William Clowes & Sons,
the enthusiasm of contemporary Swedish architects for the application of Chinese- London, 1924, p. 47. Below:
inspired forms:58 the finest example is Stockholm Town Hall (1923), designed by ‘Section through shell’, detailed
section showing the proposed
Ragnar Östberg (1866–1945).59 A favourite building of Utzon, Stockholm Town Hall
red mullion of movable glass
has a Chinese-inspired curved and projecting roof set atop massive urban-scale city walls on the two lateral sides
walls. Within Östberg’s vast building, enlarged and gilded Chinese lattice patterns of the Opera House, 1958;
cover the walls of the Council Chamber. The ‘Chinese’ gold, white and red decoration J. Utzon, Sydney National Opera
of Östberg’s Council Chamber is again seen in Utzon’s proposed acoustic ceiling for House (Red Book), Atelier
Elektra, Copenhagen, 1958
the Major Hall at Sydney [2]. Moreover, Utzon’s early proposal to burnish the soffits
(State Records NSW 12707).
of his groups of shells with gold leaf certainly has a resemblance to Östberg’s Golden Reproduced with permission
Hall at Stockholm, which was embellished with gold mosaics [5]. With their compa- from State Records Authority of
rable colour schemes, Chinese-inspired forms and similar waterfront sites in their city New South Wales

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

286
Fig 5.  The perspective from
staircase between the two
halls looking towards the
north, in Utzon’s competition
drawings for the Sydney
Opera House in 1956. Source:
Jørn Utzon—Sydney Opera
House collection, 1956–1967,
Manuscripts Section & Pictures
Section, Mitchell Library, State
Library of New South Wales,
State Records NSW 12825.
Reproduced with permission
from State Records Authority of
New South Wales

centres, Jørn Utzon’s Opera House is his reverential Sydney version of Ragnar Östberg’s
Stockholm Town Hall.

Undoubtedly, Östberg’s Stockholm Town Hall has affinities with Adelcrantz’s Chinese
Pavilion (1763–1769) at Drottningholm Palace. The most obvious reference is Östberg’s
use of vibrant colours to complement his Chinese-inspired interior spaces.60 Also, both
buildings contain principal rooms and halls named after the exotic major colours of their
interiors: red, yellow, blue and gold. These two buildings are of two distinctive styles,
namely Chinoiserie within the Swedish rococo style at Drottningholm and National
Romanticism within the Neo-Gothic model for Stockholm Town Hall. However, their
strong interior colours contrast markedly with the subdued and conservative palettes
of their respective eras.

Utzon would have perceived the similarities between these two fine buildings during
his time in Stockholm, particularly as he lived in the adjoining suburb of Drottningholm
from 1942–1945.61 Later, Utzon’s proposed designs for the Sydney Opera House
similarly included thematic auditoriums characterized by forceful oriental colours: the
Major Hall painted gold, white and red, the Minor Hall in silver, black and blue, and the
Experimental Theatre in black and blue. These colours, with their vivid contrasts, power-
fully recall the Chinese-inspired forms of both Östberg’s Swedish National Romanticism
and the eighteenth-century origins of that romanticism.

Utzon’s 1958 journey to China

During the preparation of his competition entry for the Sydney Opera House in 1956,
Utzon was also planning a trip to ‘Red’ China.62 Subsequently, in the summer of 1958,

Chiu Chen-Yu, Philip Goad and Peter Myers

287
 Fig 6.  Two of Utzon’s
preliminary conceptual
sketches of the Sydney
Opera House with
accompanying photographs
of the Three Large Halls.
Source: Jørn Utzon—
Sydney Opera House
collection, preliminary and
miscellaneous drawings,
1956–1967, Manuscripts
Section and Pictures, Mitchell
Library, State Library of New
South Wales. PXD 492/
fr.175 and PXD 493/fr.179.
Reproduced with permission
from Mitchell Library, State
Library of NSW

on his way back to Denmark from his second visit to Australia, Utzon spent three
months travelling in China. In Beijing, Utzon visited the former Forbidden City, pho-
tographing and collecting images of Imperial palaces and shrines, including the Three
Large Halls (三大殿) of the Outer Court (外朝). In terms of defining the Sydney Opera
House’s colour expression, this in-situ experience of Imperial Chinese architecture
played three important roles in synthesizing Utzon’s designs: first, the related major col-
ours of the podium, glass wall mullions and shell vaults; second, the cladding of glazed
and unglazed white ceramic tiles on the shell vaults and third, the colour compositions
of the acoustic ceilings for both the Major and Minor Halls.

As documented in his own 8mm film, in 1958 Utzon spent a lot of his time at the Three
Large Halls of the Forbidden City [Supplementary Fig 1]. These buildings represented the
highest status of Imperial Chinese palaces and shrines; consequently, they displayed the
three most important colours, which were exclusive to the Emperor: yellow for glazed roof
tiles, red as the principal colour for all carpentry and white for the marble clad podiums.
Following his trip to China, Utzon now proposed three tiers of external colours for his
Opera House at Sydney. He used white, gold and a reddish pink, thus acknowledging

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

288
 the three Imperial reserved colours: white, yellow and red. As he developed his designs
between the two major tiers—the white ceramic tile cladding of the shell vaults and the
reddish pink-hued granite in the pre-cast concrete cladding of the podium—Utzon pro-
posed a type of ‘metallic’ gold, hot-bonded bronze laminate to cover the plywood glass
wall mullions (a radical change from his earlier scheme of red, movable glass mullions) [2].
These bronze laminate mullions are visually similar to the linear gilding on the bracketing
substructure of Beijing’s Three Large Halls, which Utzon inspected [Supplementary Fig 1].63

Analogies with the Three Large Halls at Beijing are confirmed by Utzon’s conceptual
sketches for the glass wall mullions for each group of shell vaults at Sydney [6].64
Utzon’s sketches show composite sections and elevations of Beijing’s Three Large Halls,
made in order to study their external form, especially the projecting eaves of their roof
volumes. Therefore, it is safe to assert that Utzon’s combination of shell vaults and
multifaceted plywood mullions at Sydney can be seen as his transformation of the
relationship he observed between the roof volumes and projecting eaves of Beijing’s
Three Large Halls [2].

Utzon’s bent and multi-joint glass wall mullions, made with special plywood sections,
are his reinterpretation of the projecting and inclined timber rafters of traditional
Chinese eaves. This reference again demonstrates Utzon’s pursuit of a historical monu-
mentality derived from Imperial China. This also reminds us that Utzon’s ‘vision’ for his
Sydney Opera House also resembles the floating roofs and projecting eaves set against
the multi-tiered podiums below the Three Large Halls at Beijing [1]. All of this suggests
that Utzon was shifting his design philosophy to a more detailed structural expression
and tectonic interpretation of Chinese architecture.

A similar design process can be seen in Utzon’s approach to

the shell vault cladding. Utzon’s original idea for the Sydney
Opera House shells, as presented in his 1956 competition
design, was a structural expression of white and smooth
concrete membranes clad with ceramic tiles. One year later,
in his Red Book, Utzon developed his earlier proposal for
an external cladding of ceramic tiles with a full-size mock-
up. Over the next three years, Utzon meticulously studied
the properties of different tiles with Höganas, the Swedish
industrial tile manufacturer. Following unavoidable delays
in the design and construction of his spherical shell vaults,
Utzon commenced the final stage of roof construction in
1964. Here, Utzon used both glazed and unglazed white
ceramic tiles as the roof cladding [7]. Utzon attributed his
very radical proposal to Chinese building technology, which
we can now assume to be associated with his protracted
studies of Imperial Beijing:

[. . .] The material would have to be sought in the building

of the ancient world, which has stood up to many years
use without deterioration, but has aged and acquired
Fig 7.  Photograph showing harmonious patina, and the only material that would
the cladding both of glazed and
satisfy such demands was found to be the ceramic tile.
unglazed white ceramic tiles on
the shell vaults of the Sydney
Opera House, as designed [. . .] Studies were carried out in the homelands of the art ceramics, China and
by Utzon, 2011. Source: Japan, from where I brought back samples for further studies of textures, colours,
photograph by Chiu Chen-Yu glazes, etc.65

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289
As Utzon had already observed in Beijing, vibrant colours for roof tiles were exclusively
for Imperial use, as in the Forbidden City. They represented the superiority and sacred-
ness of the feudal monarchy, and certain types of glazed tiles could be only applied to
Imperial palaces and shrines. Indeed, the colours of glazed tiles not only emphasized
the roof forms but also enforced the grading of Imperial building typologies and hier-
archies. Consequently, yellow glazed tiles were only used in the Imperial court, as a
symbol of the earth and the Emperor, as seen as the Three Large Halls of the Forbidden
City. Blue glazed tiles were only for Imperial Shrines (being more superior and symbolic
of Heaven and God, for example, at the Altar of Heaven). This analogy between the
roof colours, religion and natural phenomena in Imperial China inspired Utzon to see
the white roof tiles on his shell vaults as representing the cloud—‘nature’s colour’: ‘[. . .]
I had what you would call nature’s colours on the exterior. That was the general idea—
concrete, granite and ceramics [. . .] the overall shape of the hall, a free form hanging
like a cloud in the sky.’66

Utzon’s use of the word ‘clouds’ confirm that, to him, the Opera House was not only
monumental but also sacred, just like the Imperial palaces and shrines in Beijing. This
analogy shows Utzon’s unusual marriage of ancient symbolism and architectural crea-
tion; Utzon conceived the Sydney Opera House as a type of temple to the modern per-
forming arts. At the same time, the spherical shell vaults and their white glazed ceramic
tile cladding can certainly be seen as Utzon’s design progression and show his shifting
from an initial structural expressionism to a much more sophisticated and expressive
historicism. This decisive shift directly corresponds with Utzon’s growing understanding
of Chinese traditional architecture.

Utzon’s acquisition of the sumptuous 1925 Yingzao fashi (營造法式) significantly

influenced his understanding of Chinese building culture. Before his 1958 trip to
China, Utzon was already familiar with the Yingzao fashi. In the collection of Utzon’s
uncle, Einar Utzon-Frank, there was a 1919 lithographic edition of the Yingzao
fashi.67 This copy was originally bought by Osvald Sirén in Shanghai in 1919 and
then presented to Utzon-Frank as a personal gift.68 This would explain why, during
his stay in Beijing, with the help of Professor Liang Sicheng, Utzon purchased two
copies of the 1925 edition of the Yingzao fashi for himself and his son Jan (who had
already decided to be an architect).69 Utzon’s two 1925 sets were lavishly printed
from woodblocks with carefully reconstructed drawings and colours, in contrast to
the monochromatic photo-lithographic printing of his uncle’s 1919 edition. During
the design program of the Sydney Opera House, the Yingzao fashi was often taken
by Utzon from his own house to the site office. Utzon frequently studied the colour-
ful illustrations to gain inspiration and showed them to his colleagues to clarify his
ideas by analogy to the Middle Kingdom.

The carefully manipulated colours in the 1925 Yingzao fashi were the outcome of sig-
nificant modern Chinese scholarship conducted by Officer Zhu Qiqian (1872–1964).70
Zhu Qiqian found a surviving manuscript copy of the Yingzao fashi in Nanking’s Kiangsu
Provincial Library and had it photo-lithographically printed in 1919. Later, Zhu Qiqian
established his Institution for Research in Chinese Architecture, and he and his fellow
researchers edited and republished the Yingzao fashi in 1925. To them, the 1925 edi-
tion of Yingzao fashi, with its colour-synthesized Chinese building patterns, rhetori-
cally dramatized the expressivity and superiority of the architecture ancient China as an
example for the modern world and was their challenge to the dominant trends of mod-
ern architectural culture.71 For these scholars, the addition of colour represented their
nationalist approach to forwarding and portraying traditional Chinese architecture. Very

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

290
 possibly, the 1925 Yingzao fashi colour printing technique was
influenced by earlier works of Owen Jones (1809–1874) that
illustrated Chinese ornament using chromolithography.72

The 1925 Yingzao fashi is comprised of eight volumes, the

last two of which focus on the decorative coating and paint-
ing of Imperial carpentry. The illustrations of painted brackets
in the eighth volume are instructive as to Chinese thinking on
colours. A  distinctive pattern for brackets, Huangtu shuashi
(黃土刷飾), was painted in three colours—yellow ochre, cin-
nabar red and clay white [8]. Basically, yellow was applied to
the front elevation of a whole bracketing set and then white
was applied on the lateral sides and edge of each of bracket-
ing unit. Red was only applied to the middle key projecting
units on their front elevations. Together, in the painting of
traditional Chinese carpentry, this combination gives yellow
as the primary colour, white as the boundary and red as the
dominant.

In Utzon’s final scheme for the acoustic ceiling in the Major

Hall, he transformed the yellow of the Chinese bracketing
set into gold with two other colours similar to those in his
Song manual [2]. In Utzon’s 1966 final model, yellow gold was
used as the dominant colour on the lateral sides in order to
express his ceiling geometry. In the same way, the use of white
in Utzon’s scheme played a similar role to a painted Chinese
bracketing set wherein the colour visually accentuated the
boundary of each curved ceiling element. Moreover, the red
in the centre between the two white bands on the longitu-
dinal side of each segment is applied as the focal theme for
the whole assembly. By contrasting the use of yellow gold on
the lateral side, the interplay between white and red on the
longitudinal side of the acoustic ceiling was used to highlight
the division and subdivision of Utzon’s whole composition,
and to enhance his ceiling’s radial geometry towards the stage
proscenium. To Utzon, the typical painted bracketing sets illus-
trated in the Yingzao fashi suggested a way of synthesizing
one composition with three once-important Imperial colours.
The relationship of these three ‘Imperial colours’ in the acous-
tic ceilings of his designs for the Major Hall replicates the three
tiers of monochromatic colours of Utzon’s massive roof/earth-
work juxtaposition: his bronze/gold glass wall mullions are a
mediating element in Utzon’s vast composition.
Fig 8.  Decorative patterns
for bracketing sets (above) and Through his study of the Yingzao fashi, Utzon understood
for inter-bracket-set boards that inter-bracket-set boards were usually finished with
(below) in the 1925 edition of black, white and blue seen as Nianyuzhuang gongyanbi
Yingzao fashi. Source: Li Jie & (碾玉裝拱眼壁), in direct contrast with the composition of yellow, white and red of
Zhu Qiqian, Li Mingzhong ying a typical bracketing set [8]. Consequently, Utzon was inspired to transfer the white
zao fa shi: 36 juan, Tao Xiang:
Chuan jing shu she fa xing,
of the typical board into silver with two other empathic colours for the Minor Hall,
Wujin, 1925, vol. 8, ch. 34, where silver was applied to the lateral sides, black was used for two bands on the
plates 18 (above) and 8 (below) longitudinal sides and a blue band was in the centre, between the two black bands.

Chiu Chen-Yu, Philip Goad and Peter Myers

291
The visual effect of the proposed colour composition for the Minor Hall was inten-
tionally contrasted with the Major Hall, as Utzon explained:

[. . .] The theater darker and warm, the concert hall more cold and light plywood
[. . .]. The Major Hall was to be used for Grand Opera and concerts with an opti-
mistic, light colour scheme [. . .]. The Minor Hall was programmed primarily for
theatrical productions, which require a relatively dark or subdued colour scheme
for the auditorium [. . .].73

Certainly, Utzon’s study of the Yingzao fashi influenced his synthetic colour schemes
for the Sydney Opera House, with their deliberately contrasting visual effects. These
Chinese-inspired and contrasting colours also reflect Utzon’s reading of Sirén’s natural-
istic and dualist concept of China’s culture and its symbolic colours:

[. . .] Chinese call the positive creative principle—Yang principle. It represents light,

heat, sun and all those concepts with productive power in both spiritual and mate-
rial respects. The opposite principle is Yin, which is negative, representing the
darkness, earth, moon; it is a suspension or absorbing force, in contrast with the
power of positive energy. Yang principle is symbolized by the dragon, Yin by the
tiger; the colour of former is green or deep blue, the latter is orange. When these
two basic elements are brought into harmony, happiness and prosperity prevail in
the Middle Kingdom and the people live in peace.74

To Sirén, this contrasting principle, as ‘the movement or creative forces’ and as ‘a striv-
ing to express something of the life-impetus’, was found everywhere in ancient China.
It was because ‘the development of architecture in China has since the earliest times
been largely determined by an intimate contact with nature’ and ‘they planned their
buildings with reference to the spirits of the earth, the water and the winds, they
built their palaces according to heavenly constellations’.75 Significantly, Sirén’s words
suggest that the contrasting colour schemes for these two Halls represents Utzon’s
expressive fusion of human culture and Nature in his Sydney Opera House design:
this may explain why Utzon described the overall colour scheme of his Sydney Opera
House as ‘nature’s colours on the exterior’ in contrast with the ‘festive colours’ of the
halls inside.76 However, at the time of his forced resignation from the Opera House
project in 1966, Utzon had not completed his colour studies for the Minor Hall. Since
his departure, none of Utzon’s proposed colour schemes have been realized. Today,
only Utzon’s combination of Chinese White ceramic tiles and reddish-pink hued granite
faced concrete together expressing his masterful roof/earthwork juxtaposition remains.

Conclusion
This article sets out to answer three questions. First, what influences stimulated Utzon’s
appreciation of the colours of traditional Chinese architecture? Second, how did Utzon
reinterpret these Chinese colours in his creation of the Sydney Opera House? Third,
why did Utzon pursue Chinese colours for his Opera House? To answer these ques-
tions, this article had assembled fragmented but compelling archival materials to pro-
pose analogies between Utzon’s perception and interpretation of Chinese built forms
and colours. The research reveals an important relationship between Utzon’s growing
understanding of Chinese building culture and his designs for the interior and exterior
of the Sydney Opera House. Underpinning this relationship, a clear cross-cultural con-
text supports a review of Utzon’s own socio-cultural background as a catalyst for his
various proposals and design intentions for the Sydney Opera House.

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

292
 Utzon’s early perception of China reflected worldwide trends at the time in explor-
ing and elaborating projects and scholarship associated with traditional Chinese archi-
tecture, including Dahlerup’s Pantomime Theatre and Petersen’s Faaborg Museum, as
well as Rasmussen’s, Prip-Møller’s and Sirén’s scholarly work, and Adelcrantz’s Chinese
Pavilion and Östberg’s Stockholm Town Hall. These projects and scholars reflected
Nordic cultural appreciation and appropriation of Imperial China, all with the civilized
aim of portraying and promoting Scandinavia’s own emerging national identities within
the international community. Each of these examples embodies cultural intent and
imbued Utzon with a growing understanding of Chinese architecture from childhood
to his practice in the 1950s and beyond.

Utzon’s affinity with several heroic figures associated with the link between Scandinavia
and China encouraged his pivotal trip to China in 1958, following his success in the
competition to design the Sydney Opera House. While in Beijing, Utzon visited the
Forbidden City and, importantly, acquired two copies of the 1925 Yingzao fashi, a
modern and scholarly summation of traditional Chinese architecture. Utzon’s travel
experiences and his study of the colour plates of the Yingzao fashi gave him an inspir-
ing inside view of Chinese building culture, especially in its use of vibrant colours for
Imperial monuments.

The Chinese-inspired colours of the Sydney Opera House reflect Utzon’s long quest for
the festivity, monumentality and religious sacredness of Imperial China within a con-
temporary society. Utzon’s design for the Sydney Opera House, with its three groups of
spherical shell vaults on an urban-scaled podium, is very much a reinterpretation of the
monumental Three Large Halls of Beijing’s Forbidden City. Thus, to Utzon, the Sydney
Opera House was not just a modern monument for Sydney; it was also a national temple
for Australia. Today, this temple still has much to recover—it is Utzon’s still unfinished
masterpiece.

Supplementary Material
Supplementary material is available at JDH online.

Chiu Chen-Yu
Department of Architecture, Aalto University, Finland
E-mail: [email protected]

Chiu Chen-Yu graduated from Chung Yuan Christian University, Taiwan, in 2002,
with a Bachelor of Architecture degree. He achieved a Master’s degree in Urban
Design at Columbia University in New York in 2005 and received his Ph.D. at the
Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning, the University of Melbourne, in 2011.
His primary research interest is in the cross-cultural/national relationships within the
field of architecture.

Philip Goad
Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning, The University of Melbourne, Australia
E-mail: [email protected]

Philip Goad is Chair of Architecture at the University of Melbourne. He has published

widely in Australian architecture as an architectural historian and as a design critic,
including in the fields of modernism, residential, community, institutional and commer-
cial building design, individual architects and contemporary design thinking.

Chiu Chen-Yu, Philip Goad and Peter Myers

293
Peter Myers
Peter Myers Architect, Australia
E-mail: [email protected]

Peter Myers worked for Jørn Utzon on the Sydney Opera House until Utzon’s
forced resignation in 1966. In 1970, he established his own practice in Australia
and has undertaken several award winning projects. He also taught in Sydney and
writes variously on Utzon’s design ideas, urban consolidation and architectural
history.

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Notes well as Antonie Bosc de la Calmette’s Chinese Garden on

the island of Mon near Liselund and the gardens of the
1 This image was first published in Jørn Utzon’s 1962 mani- Frederiksberg Palace (1799–1800). See T.  Clemmensen
festo ‘Platforms and Plateaus: Ideas of a Danish Architect’, & M.  B. Mackeprang, Kina og Danmark 1600–1950,
Zodiac, vol. 10, 1962, p. 117 and republished in J. Utzon, Kinafart og Kinamode 1600–1950, National Museum,
Sydney Opera House: Utzon Design Principles, The Sydney Copenhagen, 1980, pp. 220–34, 263–6.
Opera House Trust, Sydney, 2002, p. 6.
9 Ibid., pp. 67–82.
2 Utzon, Sydney Opera House, op. cit., p. 81.
10 The terms ‘Post-classicism’ and ‘International Historicism’
3 Ibid., p. 81. are defined by K.  Millech & K.  Fisker; see their Danske
4 China was not the only inspiration for Utzon’s design of the arkitekturstromninger, 1850–1950, Østifternes
Sydney Opera House. Utzon was also strongly influenced by Kreditforening, Copenhagen, 1951, pp. 352–5.
Islamic and pre-Columbian architecture in his design process. 11 M. Keiding, M. Amundsen & K. Dirckinck-Homdeld, Danish
However, Islamic and pre-Columbian architecture’s precise Architecture Since 1754, Arkitektens Forlag, Copenhagen,
role in Utzon’s Sydney Opera House design is still unclear. 2007, pp. 116–17.
See R.  Weston, Utzon: Inspiration, Vision, Architecture, 12 Jan Utzon interview, Sydney, 2008. The unique sig-

Edition Bløndal, Hellerup, Denmark, 2002, p. 186. nificance of Dahlerup’s Pantomime Theatre in Utzon’s
5 The role of Chinese colours in Utzon’s Sydney Opera design proposals for the Sydney Opera House has now
House is first argued by Peter Myers in his ‘Une his- been confirmed by Utzon’s eldest son, Jan. Jan Utzon
toire inachevée’, L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, no.  285, states that the Pantomime Theatre played a key role
February 1993, p.  65. Later, in Jørn Utzon: The Sydney in inspiring his father to make a series of analogies to
Opera House, Gingko Press, Berkeley, CA, 1998, Françoise Chinese built forms in his design process for the Sydney
Fromonot notes the important role of the Yingzao fashi Opera House.
in Utzon’s colour schemes, but does not clarify its precise 13 Utzon, Sydney Opera House, op. cit., pp. 59–60.
role (p.  177). Recently, Weston, op. cit., provides a com-
14 Ibid., pp. 59–60.
prehensive summation of previous scholarship on Utzon.
However, this book only refers to the colour scheme of the 15 Ibid., p. 59.
two main Halls as ‘organic decoration systems’ (p. 180). 16 J. Utzon, ‘National Opera House, Sydney, Architect: Jørn
6 Interviews with Utzon’s children—Jan Utzon, Lin Utzon Utzon’, Arkitektur, 1 August 1957, p. 50.
and Kim Utzon—Copenhagen, 2009. 17 Ibid., p. 59.
7 For the history of development of the Tivoli Gardens 18 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009.
and its interrelationship with Hans Christian Andersen’s 19 Petersen’s oriental references in his Faaborg Museum were
The Nightingale, see E.  Oxfeldt, Nordic Orientalism, influenced by the Thorvaldsen Museum (1839–1848) of
Paris and the Cosmopolitan Imagination 1800–1900, Gottlieb Bindesbøll (1800–1856). This museum, repre-
Museum Tusculanum Press & University of Copenhagen, sentative of Danish liberal historicism in its Neoclassicist
Copenhagen, 2005, pp. 55–82. designs, was finished with colours inspired by Pompeii,
8 Such as Andreas Kirkerup’s three Chinese Pavilions in the Greece and Egypt. For the Chinese-inspired built forms of
first Chinese Garden in Dronninggaard (1781–1786), as the Faaborg Museum, see M. Gelfer-Jørgensen, ‘Apropos,

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

294
 A  Classicist-Japonist Symbiosis’, Scandinavian Journal of 34 T. Faber, ‘Kay Fisker’, Kay Fisker, Arkitektens Forlag,

Design History, vol. 4, 1994, p. 54. Copenhagen, 1995, pp. 34–5.

20 The Peacock Room was once the dining room in the 35 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009. See K. Fisker,
London home of Frederick Leyland (1832–1892); its inte- ‘Peking’, Arkitekten, 1923; S. E. Rasmussen, Billedbog fra
rior was designed in large part by James McNeill Whistler en Kinarejse, Copenhagen, 1935; S.  E. Rasmussen, Rejse
(1834–1903) for displaying Leyland’s prized collection I Kina, Carit Andersens Forlag, Copenhagen, 1958.
of Chinese porcelain. Today, Whistler’s Peacock Room is 36 In 1923, the Danish East Asiatic Company assisted Professor
exhibited at the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington. Steen Eiler Rasmussen (1898–1990) with his trip to China.
21 Gelfer-Jørgensen, op. cit., p. 54. See T.  Faber, Kina-Danmark: Arkitektonisk Set, Nytaar,
Udgivet af Kunstakademiets Arkitektskole, Copenhagen,

22 Such as the Dansk Kunstbandel (Danish Art Gallery,
1986, p. 10. Also see Rasmussen, Rejse I Kina, op. cit., 1958,
1917), and many Chinese influenced ceramics of the Bing
p. 88, where Rasmussen’s watercolour painting represented
& Grøndahl porcelain factory. See T.  Lyngby, ‘Chinese
the blue glazed tile roof of the Altar of Heaven in old Beijing.
Classics—Danish Modern’, China in Denmark, The Museum
of National History at Frederiksborg, Frederiksborg, 2008, 37 T. Faber, Johannes Prip-Møller, A Danish Architect in China,
p. 114. Tao-Fong-Shan Christian Center, Hong Kong, 1994, p. 30.

23 C. Petersen, ‘Porcelæn’ (‘Porcelain’), Kunstbladet, 1909– 38 This model was constructed by two Chinese craftsmen,
1910, pp. 134–43. Yang Wenchi and Yuan Shihchang, under the supervi-
sion of the Society for Research in Chinese Architecture in
24 Ibid., pp. 134–43. Beijing (1933–1935). Letters between Prip-Møller and the
25 Ibid., pp. 134–43. Society survive in the Johannes Prip-Møller Archives, The
Danish National Library, Copenhagen.

26 C. Petersen, ‘Stoflige Virkninger’ (‘Textural Effects’),
Arkitekten, 1919, pp. 253–7. 39 See letter from Professor Liang to Prip-Møller, dated 22
July 1933 (Prip-Møller Archives, The National Library,

27 T. Faber & J.  Utzon, ‘Tendenser i Nutidens Arkitektur’,
Denmark).
Arkitekten, vols. 7–9, 1947, p. 69.

40 Jan Utzon interview, Copenhagen, 2009. See J.  Prip-
28 Ibid., p.  69. See the English translation of this article in Møller, Chinese Buddhist Monasteries: Their Plan and Its
K.  Frampton, Studies in Tectonic Culture: The Poetics Function as a Setting for Buddhist Monastic Life, G.E.C.
of Construction in Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Gad, Copenhagen, 1937.
Architecture, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1995, p. 252.

41 See Clemmensen & Mackeprang, op. cit. The New
29 These four images are: The local shrine in Shandong Carlsberg Foundation also supports related exhibitions and
province, from E.  Boerschmann, Picturesque China, publications between China and Denmark; see ‘Treasures
Architecture and Landscape: A Journey through Twelve from Imperial China, The Forbidden City and The Royal
Provinces, Brentano’s, New York, 1923, plate 55; the Danish Court’ (2006) and ‘China in Denmark 1600–2000’
pagoda of Tienning monastery and the city wall of (2008).
Imperial Beijing from O. Sirén, Billeder Fra Kina [Images
42 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009.
of China], Gyldendalske Boghandel, Copenhagen, 1937,
plate 59, and O. Sirén, The Walls and Gates of Peking, 43 With a total of 465 publications, mainly in English and
William Clowes & Sons, London, 1924, plate 40; and a Swedish, Sirén’s China scholarship encompassed substan-
vernacular building in Yunnan province from P. Claudel tial areas of Chinese art: painting, sculpture, architecture,
& H.  Hoppenot, Chine, Albert Skira, Geneva, 1946, gardens, calligraphy, city planning, philosophy and history.
p. 57. See G. Munthe, ‘Bibliografi’, Osvaldo Sirén Octogenario Die
Sexto Aprilis A.D. MCMLIX, Natur och Kultur Stockholm,
30 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009.
Stockholm, unpaginated.
31 Many Kinds of Things is the English title of the portfolio
44 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009.
catalogue of Utzon-Frank’s collection—Mange slags Ting
(S. Rindholt, Mange slags Ting: et Udvalg af Billeder fra 45 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009.
Professor Einar Utzon Franks Samling, Arkæologi, Kunst. 46 See Sirén, The Walls and Gates of Peking, op. cit., Figs 47, 52.
Kunsthaandværk, Etnografi, Copenhagen, 1942).
47 Faber & J. Utzon, op. cit., p. 69.
32 P. Bech, Jørn Utzon: The Architect’s Universe (DVD version),
48 Utzon’s initial proposal was later transformed and realized
Louisiana Museum, Copenhagen, 2007.
as his reddish-pink hued granite-faced concrete cladding
33 Jan Utzon interview, Sydney, 2008. for the podium.

Chiu Chen-Yu, Philip Goad and Peter Myers

295
 49 As Utzon’s chief assistant for his Sydney Opera House pro- 63 For the details of the Three Large Halls, see K. C. Chiu,
ject, Mogens Prip-Buus, wrote to the authors on 26 June The Grand Forbidden City—The Imperial Axis, The
2013, ‘Movable red glass mullions: When we produced the Palace Museum Publisher, Hong Kong, 2008, pp. 123–
Red Book, we had no ideas about the way of making the 50. One may interpret the three groups of roofs of
glass walls; we only indicated graphically that there should the Opera House, on their urban-scaled podium, as
be some, remember that the competition scheme had none’. Utzon’s analogy to the Three Large Halls (三大殿) in
the Forbidden City. Symbolically, the restaurant on

50 For the issue of Sweden National Romanticism and its
the southern podium of the Opera House recalls the
cultural exploration of ancient China, see M.  Fiskesjö &
Hall of Central Harmony (中和殿, the middle Hall),
C.  Xingcan, China before China, Museum of Far Eastern
and the two main Halls separately recall the Hall of
Antiquities, Stockholm, 2004.
Supreme Harmony (太和殿, the front Hall) and the Hall
51 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009. of Preserving Harmony (保和殿, the back Hall) of the
52 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009. Forbidden City. In both assemblies, the outward forms
of the two main Halls are very similar, and each may be
53 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009.
seen as a representation of the other.
54 Else Glahn interview, Birkerød, 2009.
64 See Jørn Utzon—Sydney Opera House collection, 1956–
55 Else Glahn interview, Birkerød, 2009. Utzon, Faber and 1967, Manuscripts Section and Pictures, Mitchell Library,
Glahn lived in Stockholm during the Second World War. State Library of New South Wales.
In the late 1950s and the 1960s, Utzon met with Glahn
65 J. Utzon, ‘The Roof Tiles’, Architecture in Australia,

several times in Japan, where she organized traditional
December 1965, p. 85.
Japanese architecture tours and tea ceremonies for Utzon.
From the 1960s onwards, Utzon often called Glahn to dis- 66 Ibid., p. 58.
cuss the Yingzao fashi. 67 Else Glahn interview, Birkerød, 2009.
56 This fine collection of Chinese paintings was moved to the 68 Else Glahn interview, Birkerød, 2009. In the late 1930s,
Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities in 1959. Utzon-Frank donated this book to the library of the Royal
Academy, where, as students, Utzon and his two lifetime
57 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009.
friends, Tobias Faber and Else Glahn, together studied this

58 They include Ragnar Östberg (1866–1945), Cyrillus copy of the Yingzao fashi in great detail.
Johansson (1884–1959) and Albin Stark (1885–1960).
69 Jan Utzon interview, Sydney, 2008.
59 Although it is uncertain if Östberg and Sirén knew each
70 See L. Zhu, Zhong Guo Ying Zao Xue She Shi Ive (The Brief
other, Sirén was a mentor of Östberg’s most notable fol-
History of the Society for Research in Chinese Architecture),
lower—Cyrillus Johansson. Many works of Johansson can
Baihua Literature and Art Publishing House, Beijing, 2008,
also be seen as his interpretation of Chinese monuments. See
pp. 72–4, and also see W. Fairbank, Liang and Lin: Partners
C. Johansson, The Building and The Town: From a Swedish
in Exploring China’s Architectural Past, University of
Architect’s Practice, Nordisk Rotogravyr, Stockholm, 1936,
Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 1994, pp.49–53.
and A. Stjernlöf-lund, Cyrillus Johansson, Från Askersund till
Östersund, Bild, Text & Form, Karlstad, 2008. 71 Else Glahn interview, Birkerød, 2009.
72 Else Glahn interview, Birkerød, 2009. Owen Jones published
60 See Å. Setterwall, S.  Fogelmarck & B.  Gyllensvärd, The
two influential books containing Chinese decorative patterns:
Chinese Pavilion at Drottningholm, Allhems Forlag, Malmö,
The Grammar of Ornament, Day & Sons, London,1856, and
1974.
The Grammar of Chinese Ornament: Selected from Objects
61 Tobias Faber interview, Copenhagen, 2009. in the South Kensington Museum and Other Collections,
62 Utzon went to the Chinese Embassy in Copenhagen to Parkgate Books, London, 1867. Both of these were richly
apply for his travel visa in 1956. Apparently, the Chinese illustrated, lavishly printed and carefully researched.
embassy was surprised by Utzon’s application, though they 73 Utzon, Sydney Opera House, op. cit., p. 80.
still granted him a visa before the outcome of the Sydney
74 Sirén, Billeder fra Kina, op. cit., p. 12.
Opera House competition in early 1957. Interview, Oslo,
2009, with Dagny Kjøde, the wife of Norwegian architect 75 O. Sirén, The History of Early Chinese Art: Architecture,
Gier Grung, who was Utzon’s friend and travel companion Ernest Benn, London, 1930, p. i.
on this journey to China. 76 Utzon, Sydney Opera House, op. cit., p. 34.

Chinese Colours and the Sydney Opera House (1956–1966)

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