El Alamein Fountain

The Australian 9th Division fought in both the first (July 1942) and second (November 1942) battles of El Alamein during World War II. Both were important for the course of the war. They halted the advance of Axis forces into Egypt and routed them, and are considered a turning point in the Western Desert Campaign. The El Alamein Fountain in Sydney commemorates the Australian army's roles in the North Africa campaign in general, Competition for the El Alamein Memorial Fountain Woodward & Taranto won the main prize of in 1959 in the City Council fountains competition. The competition had been organised by the Sydney Fountains Committee, which was established in September 1958. Its aim was to put fountains in public places in Sydney to enhance their natural beauty and to commemorate families, individuals and organisations. A Designs Committee was responsible for the design competitions for fountains in a number of selected sites, such as the Fitzroy Gardens in Kings Cross, Moore Park, Customs House Square, and Macquarie Place. The competition for the Fitzroy Gardens fountain was assessed by a panel of architects (Max Collard, President of the RAIA (NSW Chapter), and Professor Leslie Wilkinson), sculptors (Douglas Annand), and the City Council. together with Phill Taranto was commissioned to build the fountain Woodward, himself an Army veteran, was 36 at the time The fountain made such a name for Woodward and the firm that he went on to design many others, and his fountains are his best-known works. The design Woodward's Modernist design has been variously described as looking like a blown thistle, or dandelion. Cultural impact The fountain won Woodward the New South Wales Institute of Architects Civic Design Award in 1964. Over the years, its iconic shape has made it a well-known landmark that has been imitated by other builders. As the focal point of the Kings Cross area, the fountain often serves as a meeting place. == Description ==

'This fountain has a globe-like shape, with a diameter of 12 ft 6 in (3.81 m) and comprises 211 radially arranged "stalks" fitted to a hollow metal globe, itself placed on top of a brass pipe column with a length of 10 ft (3.05 m) and a diameter of 4 in. (10 cm). The central globe is made of cast brass [in fact bronze, according to CMP] and its diameter measures 46 cm. Each stalk consists of a tube 1.5 inch [2 cm] thick at the base and reducing to 0.5 inch [0.8 cm] at the outer end. A specially constructed nozzle has been fitted to each of these extremities. . . [There are] three terraced pools made of concrete and covered with white mosaic glass tiles. The perimeter coping is faced with quartzite and the two upper pools' spillways are formed by bronze dentils. The water is pumped through the line strainer - at a rate of 500 gallons (2,270 litres) per minute and a pressure of 22 lb. [10 kg] per square inch - up to the central sphere where it emerges from each of the 211 nozzles as a thin 18 inch [45 cm] disc of water. These disks of water merge and create the impression of a huge thistledown [or dandelion]. The water from the nozzles falls first to the top pool and then runs between the spillway dentils from pool to pool. Through nine glory hole outlets and underground pipes the water returns into the screening baskets and back to the tanks so that it can circulate again.'. The glory holes compensate almost exactly for the consecutive reduction in weir length from pool to pool. Each glory hole drains the equivalent of ~32 troughs. This means that the weirs draining the pools and all 9 glory holes have identical flow. a cafe with large awnings and cafe furniture; and a significant amount of recently planted vegetation. Although worthwhile in their own right, many of these elements interfere with views towards the fountain and should be repositioned when possible. == Heritage listing ==

As at 28 October 2010, The El Alamein Memorial Fountain is of State significance as a spectacular fountain and outstanding work of modernist design in water which has been copied all over the world. Throughout the decades of the 1960s and 1970s it was an icon of Sydney, rivalling the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Sydney Opera House for the frequency with which it was represented in tourism imagery. Aesthetically it is rare in NSW as a local adaptation of the organic school of Scandinavian architectural design and as an example of the application of modernist design technology to fountain design. the NSW chapter of the Institute of Architects created a new design category for it, the "Civic Design Award" of which it became the inaugural winner in 1964. The place possesses uncommon, rare or endangered aspects of the cultural or natural history of New South Wales. The El Alamein Memorial Fountain is of State significance for its rarity as a war memorial in NSW which commemorates a battle rather than the loss of individual members of the armed forces. It is also unusual because its beauty as a fountain has historically almost overwhelmed its solemn function as a war memorial. The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a class of cultural or natural places/environments in New South Wales. The El Alamein Memorial Fountain is of State significance as an example of internationally outstanding fountain design and representative of excellence in Australian modernist design of the mid twentieth century. ==Similar fountains==

The overall design and hydraulic engineering of the El Alamein fountain was used in a number of other fountains designed by Robert Woodward, but also widely copied by many other fountain designers in the decades since it was first conceived. Designed by Robert Woodward Woodward used a similar design and base for the Dandelion Fountain in the plaza of 1345 Avenue of the Americas, New York in 1969, and later demolished in 2019. At the Tupperware world headquarters at 14901 South Orange Blossom Trail, Orlando, Florida, a similar fountain was installed in the building forecourt, also designed by Woodward (1970). The fountain was dedicated to the millions of independent sellers around the world, and known as the Gaylin Olson Friendship Fountain. The headquarters complex was closed in 2022. The Berger Fountain (1975) in Loring Park, Minneapolis is an approved copy, funded by Ben Berger, a former parks commissioner who saw the original. This copy was built by Woodward in Australia and shipped to Minnesota, where it was installed on a base (1974–75) that he approved. Designed by others The Ferrier Fountain built in 1972 at the Christchurch Town Hall, New Zealand has similar design and water forms built by British company Ustigate. A similar fountain can be found on the Allen Parkway on the Buffalo Bayou, Houston, Texas officially named the Gus S. Wortham Memorial Fountain, but also known as the 'Dandelion Fountain' was directly inspired by the El Alamein Fountain. It was donated to the City of Houston in 1978 by the Wortham Foundation and the American General Life Insurance company and designed by Houston architect and Rice University professor William T. Cannady. A similar fountain called the 'Dandelion Fountain' located in the centre of a roundabout at the intersection of Newtown Road and Corporation Street (A444) in Nuneaton in the United Kingdom. In 2016 it was voted 'UK Roundabout of the Year'. A similar but smaller hemisphere fountain can be found in a public square on Wolności Street, Szczytna, in south-western Poland. The 'Peacock Fountain' (Påfuglfontenen) installed in 1989 in Johanne Dybwads Plass was designed by architects Lund & Slaatto has a similar style in a hemisphere shape, sits in a public square next to the National Theatre (Nationaltheatret) in Oslo, Norway. File:Loring-park-berger-dandelion-fountain.JPG|Loring Berger Park, Minneapolis, USA File:Fountain on Johanne Dybwads plass Oslo 2010.jpg|'Peacock Fountain' (Påfuglfontenen), Oslo, Norway File:2014 Szczytna, fontanna.JPG|Comparable fountain in Szczytna, Poland (2014) File:Water Fountain - geograph.org.uk - 931.jpg|Roundabout fountain, Nuneaton, UK File:Trams de Grenoble (France) (5228607794).jpg|Grenoble, France File:Ffm-CampusBockenheim650.jpg|Campus Bockenheim, Goethe University Frankfurt, Germany File:Dandelion Fountain, Christchurch (4264951398).jpg|Dandelion Fountain, Christchurch, New Zealand File:Dandelion - Flickr - pinemikey (1).jpg|Gus S. Wortham Memorial Fountain, Houston, Texas, USA File:Fountain "Dandelion" - the oldest fountain in Saransk.jpg|Fontan "Oduvanchik", Saransk, Mordovia, Russia ==See also==