The Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre (MCEC), colloquially referred to as Jeff's Shed, is a group of three adjacent buildings next to the Yarra River in South Wharf, an inner-city suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. The venues are owned and operated by the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Trust.

Following the opening of its expansion in 2018, Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre regained the status as being the largest convention and exhibition venue in Australia and one of the largest spaces in the Southern Hemisphere.

The total size of the MCEC is 70,000 square metres. The venue consists of 63 meeting rooms, outdoor courtyard spaces, a Plenary that can be divided into three self-contained acoustically separate theatres, the Goldfields Theatre a 9,000 square metre multi-purpose event space with a retractable 1,000-seat theatre and 39,000 square metres of pillarless exhibition space.

In 2017/18, 1,124 events were held at MCEC. These events attracted 950,385 delegates, including 23 international conventions involving 28,750 delegates and 34 national conventions which attracted 38,626 delegates.

In 2018/19, the MCEC contributed more than $1.10 billion in economic impact to the state of Victoria.

Management

The Melbourne Exhibition Centre Trust (MCET) was created in August 1994 with the responsibility of overseeing the construction and development of the Melbourne Exhibition Centre. In February 1997, the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Trust began, replacing the previous trust with the added scope of the Melbourne Convention Centre, formerly called the World Congress Centre Melbourne.

In August 1997, the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Trust became owner and venue manager of both the Melbourne Exhibition Centre and the Melbourne Convention Centre.

The building was designed by Denton Corker Marshall, an architectural firm responsible for many of Melbourne's larger buildings through the early 1990s, and features their characteristic "blade" entrance. The building was originally intended to be used by the Melbourne Museum but Jeff Kennett intervened during construction to have the building used as an exhibition centre. In 1998 a covered footbridge was erected between the Exhibition and Convention centres, parallel to the Spencer Street Bridge.

thumb|Melbourne Exhibition Centre

The building has become an icon in Melbourne due to the main entrance marked by a prominent tilted metal blade supported by a pair of yellow sticks in combination with the 450 metre urban verandah, parallel to the internal concourse, supported by a forest of smaller sticks. The verandah and the new riverside park make a major contribution to the public realm of the city.

Melbourne Convention Centre

The former Convention Centre on the Flinders Street side of the Yarra River was opened in May 1990 and has hosted thousands of conventions and meetings. The centre uses a range of features in order to achieve a 6 Star Green Star environmental rating and to become the first convention centre in the world with that rating. The architects for the development were NH Architecture and Woods Bagot.

Expansion

On 5 May 2015, the Victorian State Government announced $205 million for the expansion of Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre in the 2015/16 State Budget. This project commenced in May 2016 and opened on 1 July 2018. The 20,000-square-metre expansion includes 9,000 square metres of exhibition space plus additional flexible, multi-purpose event space, 1,000-seat theatre, multiple meeting rooms, a banquet room and a café and bar.

The building design was a joint venture between architect firms: NH Architecture and Woods Bagot. The expansion is part of a larger South Wharf expansion project by Plenary Group that includes a new 347-room Novotel Melbourne South Wharf and a new 1,150-space multi-level car park – all fully connected and integrated with existing buildings.

thumb|Melbourne Convention Centre and [[Seafarers Bridge]]

Building design and architecture

Melbourne Exhibition Centre

The building resembles a long shed with separated operable walls (each valued at $250,000). This allows the space to be split from a maximum of 39,000 square metres to a minimum of 3,000 square metre spaces. The single volume with a proportion of length to width of approximately 2.5:1 was chosen. Other than the exhibition space, the building also has a basement that is able to hold 1,000 cars. Some have large windows overlooking the exhibition. The brief required DCM to work with the partially built concrete structure. According to Melbourne architect and critic Norman Day, the column-free space could be associated to the Russian Constructivist of the 1920s such as the Vesnin brothers's Kiev railway station scheme 1926.

The Melbourne Exhibition Centre was awarded the Sir Zelman Cowen Award for Public Architecture in 1996.

Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre was Gold as the state’s best venue in the VTIC Victorian Tourism Awards

Premier's Sustainability Awards 2018 - Government category for Melbourne Energy Renewable Project.

Australian Business Awards - Employer of Choice 2018 and 2017.

Notable events

Melbourne Art Fair

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The inaugural Melbourne Art Fair, a commercial art fair, was held in 1988 in the Royal Exhibition Building, started by a group of gallery-owners. It continued as a biennial event, exhibiting works from Australian and international galleries, with sales of , from 2003 being run by the new not-for-profit Melbourne Art Foundation. The fair was paused in 2016 owing to lack of interest from galleries, but relaunched in a smaller form in a temporary venue in Southbank. had to be instead changed into on online version, running 1–7 June and showing artworks from the Asia-Pacific region from 40 galleries.

Shortly following the hugely successful inaugural event, it was announced that the 2014 edition would be held at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre. The MCEC has since become the permanent home of PAX Australia, with the event held annually in either October or November (with the exception of the scheduled 2020 and 2021 shows due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the events being held online instead). In 2022, a reported 23,000 people attended the event.

PAX has coincided with GCAP and Melbourne International Games Week since 2014, It is currently the only PAX outside of the US.

Other events

  • Tanya Chua - Lemuria World Tour - 15 October 2017
  • Joker Xue - Skyscraper World Tour - 1 April 2019
  • Blockade IMARC - 29 to 31 October 2019
  • JoJo Siwa - D.R.E.A.M. The Tour - 16 to 18 January 2020
  • Planetshakers - Planetshakers Conference Melbourne 2023 - 12 to 14 January 2023
  • A-Mei-ASMR World Tour – 28 July 2023

<gallery widths="200px">

Image:MelbourneExhibitionCentre.jpg|Melbourne Exhibition Centre viewed from Crown Casino. The new convention centre can be seen under construction in the background.

Image:MelbourneExhibitionCentre-side.jpg|The Melbourne Exhibition Centre as viewed from the side

Image:MelbourneConventionCentre-construction.jpg|Melbourne Convention Centre under construction

Image:Crown Casino Complex & Melbourne Exhibition Building.jpg|Overview of Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre

File:South Wharf & Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre.jpg|South Wharf and Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre

File:MEC Glazing.JPG|Melbourne Exhibition Centre glazing

File:MezzanineBalcony.JPG|Melbourne Exhibition Centre Mezzanine balcony viewed through the concourse

File:TwoRoof.JPG|Melbourne Exhibition Centre two roofs view from north to south

File:MEC Hallno.JPG|Melbourne Exhibition Centre stencilled door numbers

File:Plenary Melbourne Exhibition and Convention Centre.jpg|Hall interior

File:Melbourne Exhibition Centre viewed from the Yarra River.jpg|Melbourne Convention Centre viewed from the Yarra River on 9 February 2018

File:Melbourne Conference Centre December 2012.JPG|The Melbourne Convention Centre in December 2012

File:Melbourne Convention Centre front view.jpg|Melbourne Convention Centre front view

</gallery>

References

  • Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre official website
  • Melbourne Convention Centre Development website
  • Denton Corker Marshall Website