Sunland founder Soheil Abedian: ‘Mariner’s Cove could be Gold Coast’s Opera House’

REFUSING Mariner’s Cove for the Broadwater would be like knocking back the Sydney Opera House, a Guggenheim Museum or a Monet painting, according to Sunland founder and architect Soheil Abedian.

An artist’s impression of Mariner’s Cove.

REFUSING Mariner’s Cove for the Broadwater would be like knocking back the Sydney Opera House, a Guggenheim Museum or a Monet painting, according to Sunland founder Soheil Abedian.

The magnum opus of the late lauded architect Zaha Hadid, Mariners Cove is not just a hotel, aquarium, gallery and museum but a striking art form in itself, Mr Abedian says.

It was made for Sunland’s waterfront site and, if not there, it will never be built.

“When you understand the spirit of the land and the environment, you cannot take one and build it somewhere else,” he said. “A Zaha is not a cut-and-paste.

An artist’s impression of Mariner’s Cove.

“No other architect, in the history of our field, has created a new art form in architecture that no one else could even create.

“Had she started a new movement? The answer is yes, but could anyone compete with her in that regard? The answer is no.

“Having the last gallery museum designed by her – to turn our back towards that – could you believe that New York City would refuse the Guggenheim Museum?

“It goes beyond the level of explanation ... we have received the greatest work of the ultimate architect that has ever set foot on this planet in Zaha Hadid.”

An artist’s impression of Mariner’s Cove.

Gold Coast councillors have a choice today, he says, which will affect the way future generations see them. It is a choice he respects and he will take the result with grace if it doesn’t go his way. But he will still own the land.

“I have the right, under the current town plan, to build a shopping centre on this site, three storey, which will increase the traffic by six times greater than what we are proposing and it is my right to do that,” he said.

Soheil Abedian from Sunland. Picture: Luke Marsden

“When they talk about the traffic ... people staying in a hotel don’t bring cars with them.

“They leave in the morning and come back in the afternoon – the people coming to theme parks such as Sea World, they come in the morning and leave in the afternoon – it is exactly the opposite and the pattern is really healthy.”

An artist’s impression of Mariner’s Cove.

Mr Abedian said the project would create 1652 jobs during construction and 1000 permanent positions afterwards and also bring more customers to the struggling Tedder Ave precinct.

Mr Abedian referred to Sydney Opera House architect Jørn Utzon, who left the now-World Heritage-listed site before its completion amid heavy criticism in 1966.

“If you look at that, and a number of other projects like the Eiffel Tower in Paris – that was designed only for an exhibition but it then became the symbol of Paris. I have no doubt this building would become a new chapter in the development industry.”

An artist’s impression of Mariner’s Cove.

From his Gold Coast home Mr Abedian urged councillors to consider the long-term benefits of the project with more depth than its height.

“We need to really look at what is right, and if it is right to put a three-storey shopping centre, so be it, but I truly believe it’s against everything that this city is built on,” he said.

“I had a visit from a man just two weeks ago and he said it is like somebody offering a Monet painting to the British Museum and them saying ‘You know what, we’re not going to accept this because we don’t have a wall to hang this incredible artwork’.

An artist’s impression of Mariner’s Cove.

“We had a guest speaker at the (Bond University) architecture school – he said in Denmark if a private citizen came and said, ‘I want to build a museum by Zaha Hadid’ the issue would not be the permit, the issue would be how much the government would pay towards that.

“Here, somebody’s offering and the people start questioning it. Where are we, trying to chase a future when art and culture becomes secondary to anything else?”