It was designed by Danish architect Jorn Utzon and built between The construction was divided into three stages - the podium, outer shells, and.

The facility features a modern expressionist design, with a series of large precast concrete "shells", each composed of sections of a sphere of. Some of those pieces weight up to 15 tones. The building is meters long and meters wide. Completed in after 14 years of much heated discussion and at a cost of almost £60 million, it is not only the most well-known Australian building in the. The roof is made up by prefabricated concrete pieces.

The architect was not invited to the ceremony. Although the roof structures are commonly referred to as \"shells\" (as in this article), they are precast concrete panels. The Opera House was finally completed, and opened in by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia. Max Dupain devoted much of the latter part of his life to photographing architecture;. The building covers acres. Rib segments, Sydney Opera House, by Max Dupain.