Opened belatedly in 2002 to commemorate the centenary of Federation in the preceding year, and costing over $400 million, Federation Square is a striking assemblage of cultural institutions, commercial buildings and performance spaces, constructed on decking over part of the Jolimont Railway Yards at the south-east corner of Swanston and Flinders streets. Sited at the city grid’s southern gateway, at a central node of road, rail and river, Federation Square is redolent with history and inherited meaning. The fractured geometry of its architecture and the triangular façade panels of its buildings – rendered in sandstone, glass and zinc – are either loved or loathed, and the publicness of some of its ‘public’ space is ambiguous. But obsessive debate over its architectural merit has not detracted from the reality that the square has provided a new focus for city visitors, consolidated facilities in Melbourne’s central arts precinct and furnished the city with a new site for public assembly. A historical summary written for the Federation Square Management Committee Pty td in 2001 was developed into the Federation Square publication (with Norman Day, Hardie Grant Books 2003).