Shrine of Remembrance

Why it matters

After the First World War, Victoria set out to build a memorial worthy of the men and women it had sent. A design competition drew 83 entries in 1923, and the winners, the architects Philip Hudson and James Wardrop, took as their model the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, one of the wonders of the ancient world. Sir John Monash, the general who had commanded the Australian Corps, backed the design as deputy chairman of the memorials committee. Work began in 1927, a public appeal raised the money within six months of opening in 1928, and the Shrine was dedicated on 11 November 1934 before a crowd of about 300,000.

A memorial placed to be seen

Where to put it was argued over for most of the 1920s. In 1921 Monash's committee set the aim, published histories record: a memorial clearly visible from the centre of the city. In 1926 the government proposed instead an Anzac Square at the top of Bourke Street, in front of Parliament House, which would have meant demolishing the Windsor Hotel; Monash opposed it on cost, and in 1927 the Domain site was chosen.

The heritage register explains why. The Shrine sits on a low hill, held in a bend of St Kilda Road, on the north–south axis of Swanston Street, the city's main street: an isolated and elevated site on the edge of the city, with an uninterrupted view along St Kilda Road from Swanston Street. The site was also chosen in the expectation that Bank Street would one day be extended to it, opening views from the west.

The parkland around it was built for it. From 1933, four to five hundred men, employed in the Depression, laid out the Shrine Reserve with strong north–south and east–west roads and diagonal paths; about 114 memorial trees went in in 1934, and Bhutan cypresses line the approach from St Kilda Road. We found no document that calls the parkland a buffer, but the heritage record's own words are isolated and elevated: the effect is a memorial standing apart from the city it faces, with grass and trees between them.

Kept in view

The view has been defended ever since. Planning controls around the Shrine have existed for decades, and in 2014 the Victorian Government made them permanent and mandatory: height limits on land to the west and south-west, controls on overshadowing, and a duty on councils to refer nearby building proposals to the Shrine's trustees. Later rules, in 2016, added limits on height, setbacks and shadow along St Kilda Road itself.

It was built for the dead of one war and now honours Victorians who have served in every conflict since Federation in 1901. The Shrine stands in a reserve of 13 hectares, with more than 250 memorial trees and plaques, and its annual report counted 537,277 general visitors in 2024–25, more than half a million people in a year. On Anzac Day 2025 more than 50,000 came to the Dawn Service alone.

The Shrine acknowledges the Bunurong people of the Kulin nation as the Traditional Owners of the land it stands on, and since 2006 it has held an annual Victorian Aboriginal Remembrance Service for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander servicemen and women.

What it's like

We came on a grey September afternoon and stood at the foot of the north steps, which rise in long granite flights to the dedication cut across the stone: erected by a grateful people to the honoured memory of the men and women of Victoria. Above it, small against the pyramid roof, people stood on the balcony looking out. Then we went down into the galleries.

Then turn and look back, as we did from the forecourt. The axis runs out across the paved forecourt, between the dark Bhutan cypresses that line the approach, down the line of St Kilda Road and on towards Swanston Street and the towers of the city. It works both ways: from Swanston Street, looking south, the Shrine closes the view, which is exactly what its builders asked of the site. Between the two lies a long green interval of lawn and trees, and you see the city from the quiet of a park, while the city sees its memorial standing clear.

The balcony takes the same idea higher. From its upper walkway the views run in every direction: north to the city, west across the forecourt laid out after the Second World War, and over the reserve and the gardens.

Inside, the heart of the building is the Sanctuary, and visitors describe it in the same words again and again: quiet, reflective, respectful. At its centre lies the Stone of Remembrance, set below the level of the floor and carved with words from the Gospel of John: Greater love hath no man. In the ambulatory around it, 42 bronze caskets hold the Books of Remembrance, with 89,100 names from the First World War.

The Sanctuary was built around a single moment. Hudson and Wardrop set an opening in the roof so that at 11am on 11 November, the hour of the 1918 Armistice, a ray of sun would fall across the stone and light the word LOVE. From 1971 daylight saving moved the ray to about midday; since 1975 a mirror placed in the roof each year has brought it back to eleven o'clock, and after the ceremony the sun reaches the stone of its own accord about midday. The beam takes some five to seven minutes to cross. In about 50 years cloud has hidden it only ten or twelve times.

Below the Sanctuary is the Crypt, with its bronze of a father and son in the uniforms of two world wars and the colours of disbanded regiments. Above it, up a stair from the Sanctuary, is the balcony.

What writers and artists have made of it

Rudyard Kipling was asked by the Premier of Victoria to write for the dedication, and his ode was read at the close of the ceremony on 11 November 1934. It was later cast in bronze and hangs inside the Shrine, at the first turn of the north-west stair. Its last lines look forward to the very effect the architects built into the roof, the sun of a hushed hour lighting the stone: And their own sun at the hushed hour shall light / The shrine of these their dead!

What to do at the Shrine

Most visitors walk through on their own, and that is enough to see everything. Three other ways of visiting are worth planning for: a guided tour, the short Last Post Service every Sunday, and the two great days of the year.

The Galleries of Remembrance

The galleries are reached from the Visitor Centre and were completed in 2014 for the centenary of the First World War. They hold more than 800 artworks and objects, and the Shrine suggests allowing at least an hour and a half. The Gallery of Medals runs 40 metres along one wall, with more than 4,000 medals on show; among the objects are a lifeboat from the troopship Devanha and the Changi Flag. We went through them on our own visit.

A guided tour

Visiting on your own works well, but reviewers single out the Shrine's volunteer guides. Tours of about 45 minutes leave the Visitor Centre every hour except at 1pm; book online or at the Information desk.

The Last Post on a Sunday

Every Sunday at 4:45pm, in the northern forecourt, the Shrine holds a Last Post Service, with a bugler, bagpipes, the laying of a wreath and the lowering of the flag. Each Sunday remembers a different event, and anyone may attend.

Anzac Day and Remembrance Day

These are the Shrine's two great days. On Anzac Day, 25 April, the Dawn Service begins at 5:30am outdoors and in all weather, and is followed by the veterans' march along St Kilda Road. On 11 November the State Remembrance Service is held in the forecourt, and at 11am the Ray of Light falls on the stone.

The Eternal Flame and the reserve

Outside, in the forecourt laid out after the Second World War, the Eternal Flame has burned since Queen Elizabeth II lit it in February 1954. Around the reserve stand other memorials worth finding, among them Peter Corlett's Cobbers, remembering the Battle of Fromelles, and Wallace Anderson's Man with the Donkey.

How to visit

The Shrine is open every day from 10am to 5pm, with last entry at 4:30pm, and closes on Good Friday, Christmas Day and some maintenance days. Entry is free and needs no ticket. You come in through the Visitor Centre, which leads to the galleries and has coffee, refreshments and toilets.

How the complex is laid out

The Shrine is a square stone building on a mound, with porticoes on its north and south sides and sculpture groups on the east and west. Everything is arranged on its axes. The table runs from the approach inwards; you enter through the Visitor Centre, which leads to the galleries and on up to the Sanctuary.

Getting there

The Shrine stands in Kings Domain on St Kilda Road, across the Yarra from the city centre. Trams 3, 5, 6, 16, 64, 67 and 72 run along St Kilda Road. Stop 19 is the nearest, but the path up from it is steep; Stop 17, at the Police Memorial, gives a ramped approach along Anzac Avenue. Anzac station, on the Cranbourne, Pakenham and Sunbury lines, is close by; take the Domain Road exit, from which the path climbs. Our guide to getting around Melbourne explains the trams and fares. There is ticketed parking on Birdwood Avenue and St Kilda Road, with accessible bays opposite the Shrine.

Access, conduct and children

The Shrine is wheelchair accessible, with a lift to the Sanctuary and accessible toilets in the Visitor Centre. The balcony is the exception: it is reached only by stairs. The Shrine does not publish the balcony's hours, so ask on arrival.

This is a place of remembrance, and the inside is kept quiet; a quiet space is available on request. Photography is allowed only where allowed; the Shrine does not list where, so ask before you raise a camera, especially in the Sanctuary. With children, the forecourt and the reserve give room to move, the lift avoids the stairs, and the Sunday Last Post is a short ceremony outdoors.

The Ray of Light is staged at 11am on 11 November, and the sun reaches the stone naturally about midday that day. The Shrine's own pages and other sources describe differently whether, and how often, the effect is demonstrated on other days, so ask at the Visitor Centre when you arrive.

Making the most of it

Nearby

The Shrine sits in the parkland of Kings Domain, with the Royal Botanic Gardens beside it. Walk north down St Kilda Road and you reach the National Gallery of Victoria and the Arts Centre, and across the river the heart of Melbourne. If you are choosing where to base yourself, our guide to where to stay in Melbourne covers Southbank and the areas around the Domain. For another side of the city's history, the Queen Victoria Market is a tram ride away.