Bold plan for $1.2 billion opera house on the Perth waterfront

Interior design for a Perth concert hall, which is intended as a sculptural representation of music. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

The design, Mr O'Riley said, was intended to be a metaphor for "what it feels like to be sculpturally inside music, without the experience of the sound".

"The living embodiment is you being inside a musical instrument, a sculpture, something that is dynamic and inspirational," he said.

At the very least, he hopes the design will start a discussion about how the city should look, and points out that the combined budgets of the new sports stadium and Elizabeth Quay total $4 billion.

"No-one cares about making Perth an international city of the future, it's all about developers," he said.

"What I've learnt in building is that you get one shot at things in a location, once you build it is there.

"It's always about our sporting prowess, not our cultural prowess, and we need to grow up."