Space age Kallangur shopping centre celebrates golden anniversary

The upcoming golden anniversary of the world’s biggest, wackiest shopping centre has locals reminiscing.

Space City at Kallangur under construction and just after opening. Images: Pat Fairhall Collection: Moreton Bay Regional Council; Queensland Places

This year marks 50 years since the world’s biggest domed shopping centre, of all places at Kallangur north of Brisbane, was ingloriously demolished in front of a crowd of locals.

Space City was a marvel of its time and the biggest inflatable concrete structure on the planet.

Amazingly, the seven domed structures were inflated with a pressure equivalent to exhaling a cigarette.

Concrete was poured over the plastic domes and windows and doors cut out once the concrete had set.

Locals recalled Space City staff dressed in space-themed costumes.

Some shops had automatically opening doors – a rarity back then.

Department store Barry and Roberts anchored the centre, which was visited by popular acts including Wickety Wak.

The site even featured in the 1980’s film Australian Dream starring Noni Hazlehurst and Graeme Blundell.

The Space City site at Kallangur.

Patented by Italian architect Dr Dante Bini in 1964, thousands of his “Bini Shells’’ were built for industrial storage, schools and more.

There were even 17 classrooms built at 14 NSW schools, some of which are still in use today.

A house at Karalee in Ipswich and a holiday home in Trinity Beach in Cairns also were constructed in the heyday of the Bini shells, from the 1970s to the 1990s.

There was even a Beecham Holden showroom on Bribie Island, but sales staff complained that the acoustics made it hard to talk to their customers.

The supermarket in its heyday.

Space City and its 35 stores, which opened in 1978, were billed as an international tourist attraction.

Dr Bini lived in Australia for seven years, working with state governments to construct his shells in several states.

Sady, the predicted good times for Space City never came to pass.

Within a few years competition from larger nearby shopping centres spelled the end for the architectural experiment.

Opening day at Space City.

Retailers moved out, the centre closed and vandals and drug addicts moved in.

Space City was finally torn down, in minutes, on December 31, 1985.

It was replaced by the much larger Kallangur Fair Shopping Centre in 1993. That centre last sold in 2021, for $22m, to a Sydney asset manager.

City of Moreton Bay resident Don Grant took to Facebook to reminisce on the golden anniversary of Space City’s demise, posting: “I was in grade 7 when they took us to watch one get raised.

And I was drinking in the Kallangur Hotel watching them get demolished.’’

Dignitaries and onlookers watch th giant balloon inflate.

Duncan Kimball posted: “What a waste. Would have made a terrific arts space.’’

Steve Hooper wrote: “I went to a nearby school and we bussed down to watch the construction.’’

Former taxi driver Pete Hoare said he picked up Dr Bini in the 1970s at Brisbane Airport.

“I do remember him saying that the pressure of exhaling a cigarette was enough to raise the balloon,’’ he posted.

Originally published as Space age Kallangur shopping centre celebrates golden anniversary