Monday, March 5, 2007

The Batman Building

When you're a kid, its easy to delight in the absurdity of what adults say, and take what they say as the truth. As a father, I am guilty of this with my kids. That's why this little divergence I feel is relevant. This building is what we know as the Batman building in our family. I'm sure I'm not unique with this. Why Batman you ask? Well, when Batman fights the evils of the city, and when he's away from Gotham visiting Brisbane, he still needs a place to work from. Hence, the Batman building.

The building is actually the State Law Building, located at 50 Ann Street, on the corner of George and Ann Streets. Appropriately, with its association with Batman, it is part of the law precinct with offices of the Queensland Department of Justice housed inside. Designed by Sipen Rojnavibul, the State Law Building was a refurbishment of Comalco House, a 25 storey commercial building designed by Conrad, Gargett and Partners Pty Ltd in 1977. In 1993,a process of upgrading services and amenities, including plant facilities, as well as giving the building a new identity was undertaken. It was then that they came up with the idea and benefit of concealing the plant facilities with a new Gotham City style "crown" which has become an iconic element in Brisbane's skyline.

The building is considered one of Brisbane's skyscrapers. It stands at 128 metres with the new structure on top. My kids are now convinced that this is where Batman lives. At night, they look out for the Bat Signal. I can't help but sing, "Na na, Na na, Na na, Na na, Bat Man" when I see it.

Cheers, I Love Brisbane, Wes.

Click Here for the Google Map Reference for this post.

13 comments:

Brooke - Little Miss Moi said...

Dear wes. I used to work here! I was so excited to work in Gotham Tower. I saw a photo of it before it was renovated, and you wouldn't recognise it. And I can say that, on some of the state law intranets, they milk the batman analogy for allll it's worth.

Michelle said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Michelle said...

I don't know of anyone who doesn't call it The Batman Building!

Pollyanna said...

Of course Batman lives there, where else would he live??

Anonymous said...

Guilty as charged - we call it the Batman building and always have done!

Anonymous said...

Yeah, there's a whole crowd of IT students who call it either the Batman or Gotham City building.

Whoo for Gothic architecture!

Anonymous said...

BATMAN IS IN THERE! I've seen him, three months ago at the big New Year's fireworks thing they have at southbank, I was in front of QPAC and the lights were on up there and I could see the silhouette of someone with POINTY EARS! He is the only reason Brisbane has a better crime rate than Sydney, simple as that...

BrisbaneStyle said...

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Anonymous said...

Heya, um wondering what exactly are those plant facilities that where hidden? sounds ominous lol

Anonymous said...

I love that building. It is easily my favourite building in Brisbane.

Holkat said...

Thank you for this wonderful piece of information. I always wondered why it was called the Batman Building.

Nx Doyle said...

Everybody who called it anything when it was remodelled called it the Gotham Building, Gotham City Building or Gotham Tower, the latter being the closest to an official nickname the building has ever had.

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