A bridge to empire – and beyond: Sydney’s ‘coat hanger’ turns 90

‘It should be acknowledged that the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the harbour city it and its twin the Opera House architecturally define, are imposed on the lands and waters of the Eora custodians.’
Photograph: Classic Image/Alamy

In early 1924, when work began on arguably this country’s most defining built structure, the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Australia was torn between self-identifying as a loyal outpost of empire and one of the globe’s most innovative new democracies.

The bridge, for all its ambition, was always going to signify – in the political, cultural and (white) Australian social sensibility of the day – more than a mere “proud arch” linking the topographically close but practically remote north shore at Milsons Point to Dawes Point in the south.