Annand Theatre From Humble Beginnings

Mr Ross Cardiff Chief Financial Officer

The initial school theatre was borne from very humble beginnings. The gathering place of the school was originally a truck maintenance depot, built in World War II by the visiting American Army when they established a military base on the school grounds. From time to time over the forthcoming years, the ‘depot’ was added to, so the school’s needs were met for House plays, parents’ meetings, new student and parent orientation and the school’s drama performances.

In February 1991 it was officially decided to design and construct a new theatre which would include all the modern facilities needed for The Southport School. The Annand Theatre was opened in August 1993.

Following a tradition of the Southport School, the theatre was named after Rhodes Scholar Peter Geoffrey Grant Annand, who attended the school from 1959-1966.

The School’s history records, aptly named ‘Bearing the Palm’ states of Annand:

‘He was a remarkable student. As a member of the Preparatory School in 1962 he won the Halse Medal for the top student in the state scholarship examination in Anglican schools. He won the school’s McNeile Memorial Medal in 1964. In 1966 he won the Lewis Cup as dux of the school and the Chelmsford Cup and was senior prefect. During the senior public examination he won an open scholarship to Queensland University and entered St John’s College at that university the following year. He graduated BA with first class honours in 1970 and was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship in 1971. He attended Magdalen College at Oxford University where he was awarded the degree of Bachelor of Civil Law with second class honours in 1973. He later became a director of Schroders Australia, merchant bankers, being the Queensland manager for that bank.’

Over the last decade, the 744-seat building struggled with the population of the Senior Campus at assemblies, Speech Day and especially Graduation. This was particularly apparent when Year 7 classes moved from the Primary campus to join the Senior School in 2013.

The consultation process of building on campus is an extensive and lengthy one. Many avenues were explored such as renovating the existing building by adding on ‘wings’ to incorporate more seating, utilising an existing structure on campus for events such as the Centenary Centre and then ultimately demolition and rebuilding a purpose-built structure..

As the project gained momentum it was the vision of then Headmaster, Mr Greg Wain, who “wanted the ability to see everyone in the audience while on stage”. This statement dictated the scale and design of the final building, incorporating seating tiers that swept up from the stage allowing each seat to be ‘seen’. Another key driver of the theatre project was the underlying need to have this area as a gathering space, a dedicated zone of the school for events and meetings. After much discussion Music was brought into the ground floor of the new building, as this space was large enough to accommodate the department’s needs now and far into the future.

The architecture of the Senior Campus is distinctive with elements that incorporate the original Clocktower building and Chapel along with the Centenary Centre. It was important that this new building sits well within the current architecture of The Southport School.

With the internal design concepts continuing over the next 12 to 18 months, the project team addressed the rather unique requirement of designing TSS buildings to ‘look like TSS’. The architecture of the Senior Campus is distinctive with elements that incorporate the original Clocktower building and Chapel along with the Centenary Centre. It was important that this new building sits well within the current architecture of The Southport School.

The final element of the journey was affordability. During the School’s tender process, the new Annand Theatre was separated into three components;

1. To build the theatre section 2. To build the music section 3. To build both theatre and music combined at the same time.

It was this combined price that made the build the most cost-effective way to undertake the project and thus the School Council approved the project in 2019.

Five years in planning and 20 months to build with COVID-19 thrown in for good measure, the Annand Theatre is now the gathering space of TSS.

The entrance foyer gallery is an events room in its own right, wrapping around to join an indoor amphitheatre and the expansive floor to ceiling glass walled River Room. The architecture certainly takes advantage of the sloping site and downstairs within the Music Centre, each classroom is flooded with sunshine overlooking the River Ovals. Incorporating two rehearsal rooms, three recording studios, control room, a dedicated Music reception and multiple staff, meeting and breakout rooms, this area cannot be considered a basement by anyone’s standards.

The theatre itself is a 1157 seat multi-purpose space divided into six tiered sections, performance stage and infrastructure with full mechanical services and audio-visual automation.

For its inaugural concert, the Annand Theatre played host to our sisterschool St Hilda’s for their performance of Matilda. Since then, we have been excited to host many different events for our community, the Queensland Opera performance of ‘Are You Lonesome Tonight’ being the most recent.

We look forward to many more events, concerts and guest speakers in this incredible space, bringing the TSS community together like never before.