The Fortitude Valley precinct is already home to several of Brisbane's foremost entertainment venues, and it will soon welcome another space from the masterminds behind The Triffid in nearby Newstead.
The new venue, which will be located in Brunswick Street Mall, is the joint project of QMusic patron and well-documented live music supporter Scott Hutchinson, former Powderfinger bassist and The Triffid head honcho John Collins, and industry all-rounder and Secret Sounds co-founder Paul Piticco, and will host a diversity of entertainment including live music, theatre and other events.
The soon-to-be-developed space at 312 Brunswick Street is the former home of the Optus Centre and the Commonwealth Bank, among other businesses, sitting next to the McWhirters complex and across the way from the historic TCB building.
The development is worth $40 million and will transform 2500 square metres of space — about 1000 of which will be used for retail, food and beverage tenancies — into a 3300-capacity, multi-purpose venue.
Its interior will be designed by the same acoustic and service team who turned The Triffid into one of the best-sounding venues in the city.
312 Brunswick is billed as being a potential successor to fill the gap left by the closure of the 4500-capacity Festival Hall in 2003 and a response to growing demand for a venue of such size in the area.
"Brisbane is an incubator for live music and a touring destination for a range of Australian and International artists," Hutchinson said in a statement. "312 Brunswick will offer a new space in the heart of Brisbane’s live music precinct to support and generate more music artistry.
"The partnership with Secret Sounds shows that Brisbane is not only ready for a venue of this size, but that it is has also come of age as a New World City that responds enthusiastically to, and financially supports, a whole range of live entertainment experiences."
"The success of The Triffid really speaks for itself," Piticco added. "It’s a great venue for the fans, of course, but particularly from the artists’ perspective.
"It’s a fantastic place to perform and we want to replicate this somewhere with more capacity — not massive, but just something that will fill the gap for a larger audience. This is another case of the right venue coming up at the right time."
Work is due to commence on the development in January next year, and is expected to be completed by mid-2019.
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