Eternal Flame MemorialPrint Page

The Eternal Flame Memorial was erected to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of World War One. An eternal flame at a war memorial represents remembrance of the service and sacrifice of all those who have given their lives in war.

This is the first artificially illuminated exterior Eternal Flame in Australia. The brief and subsequent design developed with an emphasis on the creation of a sacred space for the place on the eastern arm of the Cenotaph’s two axes. The space is created by a low and gently curving wall of precast concrete panels clad in black granite. The wall protects the flame plinth also of precast concrete. The project team considered a number of options before deciding to deliver a ‘green’ alternative to the traditional gas flames. The designs flame element has been cast in solid bronze and is protected from direct sunlight by four bronze shields. Each shield represents a division of the Australian armed forces: Navy, Army, Air Force and Merchant Navy - which collectively protect the flame. The flame is animated from below using a system of computer controlled LED lighting which adjusts from daylight to night.

The mural wall depicts other ‘natural monuments’ of the Sunshine Coast - from the left, Mount Coolum (and breaching Humpback Whale), Mudjimba or ‘Old Woman’ Island, The Pandanus trees of Alexandra Headlands and on the right, the view to the Glasshouse Mountains from Mary Cairn Cross on the ranges just behind our beautiful beaches. These have been sandblasted onto polished slabs of black granite.

The photographs were manipulated into vector art for application of stencils for sandblasting.

The design delivers on the intention to create a local and significant connection for the community’s remembrance of all past conflicts and in particular of those who paid the ultimate sacrifice of their lives, or healthy minds and bodies over the short span of Australia’s modern history.

One section right hand portion of the wall has been inscribed with 2 verses of the Ode for the Fallen written by Robert Laurence Binyon (1869-1943) , one of which reads:
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: 
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn 
At the going down of the sun and in the morning 
We will remember them.”

Above these words is a bronze triangle which depicts the texture of a wall, our world, cracked and broken by conflict. From this crack a poppy flower emerges, in memory of the fallen and with seed pods as symbol of both hope and possibility for our collective future.

Funding of $26399 was received in 2018 through the Armistice centenary Grants Program for the constrcution of the memorial. 

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