53 things to do in Melbourne this weekend

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas here in Melbourne, and to help us ring in the festive season, the City of Melbourne has announced the return of its epic, month-long Christmas Festival. From November 25 to December 25, our city will come alive with family-friendly (and mostly free!) events that are sure to turn any Grinch into a believer. 

Mark your calendars Melbourne because Always Live is back to deliver more than 60 events and 165 artists to metro venues and regional Victorian towns across November and December.

Remember the early noughties, when MySpace was still a thing and singers like Kylie Minogue, Natalie Imbruglia, and Robbie Williams ruled the airwaves? Well, it seems like 2022 is the latter pop heartthrob's comeback year. Back in April, Williams played two exclusive, sell-out shows at Rod Laver Arena for his upcoming biopic – and in 2023, he's back to play two more massive Melbourne shows.

Can you believe it? It's almost that holly jolly time of year again, and all of the early Christmas news is making us want to set up our trees already – and start packing out our calendars with fun things to do ASAP. There's a ton of bangin' (and boozy) yuletide activities in the weeks ahead, but at the top of our list is this magical Christmas-themed bar coming to District Docklands on November 22. 

Paging all bottle-confined genies and sweet-talkin’ sugar-coated candy men, the legend that is Christina Aguilera has just announced a one-off performance in Melbourne. 

For the first time in 15 years, the multi-Grammy Award-winning pop songstress will perform a special open-air concert at Melbourne’s Flemington Racecourse on Saturday, November 25. 

The festive season is well and truly here, so what better way to celebrate than with a bit of good old-fashioned choir fun? 

From November 24 to December 24, choir communities from across Melbourne will be performing all your favourite Christmas tunes at Fed Square. The diverse program has something for everyone, from gospel and Pasifika to acapella and voices from the queer community. 

You’ve likely seen the ‘Temple of Boom’ standing tall in the NGV Garden, but now there’s a new architectural work set to take shape in the gallery’s outdoor space. Building on a series of annual commissions including the much-loved Pink Pond and the aforementioned colourful Greek-style temple, this year’s NGV Architecture Commission has been announced and it’s sure to be just as breathtaking as its predecessors. However, unlike previous installations, this one will actually be doing the breathing.

Opening on November 23, ‘(This is) Air’ will see a giant inflatable sphere that literally inhales and exhales throughout the day become the centrepiece of the garden. 

We're just as sad as you are that cherry blossom season is over, but the good news is that it heralds the start of the cherry-picking season. And if you can't get enough of those sweet and juicy red morsels, then make your way to CherryHill Orchards this summer to pick and eat as many cherries as your heart desires.

This year, the cherry-picking season will kick off on November 8 at CherryHill's 40-hectare orchard in Coldstream. Then, on November 27, CherryHill's original orchard in Wandin East will also open its gates to eager pickers. 

Missed out on a golden ticket to Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour in Australia next year? Well, don’t let that bad blood fester, as this November, some of Australia’s best performers will bring the singer’s hits to the stage at the Northcote Theatre (and for a fraction of the price). 

The multi-award-winning Queenscliff Music Festival is back with a four-day celebration of live music, locally sourced produce and beverages and family-friendly activities. 

For one night only, an absolutely stacked line-up of beloved Aussie musicians are coming together to put on an epic concert to celebrate the legendary Mushroom Music Group. 

More than 20 of our favourite local music stars will play a bumper set of smash-hit songs to celebrate the record company’s 50th anniversary, including Jimmy Barnes, the Temper Trap, Amy Shark, Hunters and Collectors and heaps more. 

Can't wait for Christmas Day to celebrate? Launch into the silly season early this summer at Victoria by Farmer's Daughters. The riverside restaurant has teamed up with Four Pillars (you know, only the best gin distillery in the world) to host a series of boozy festive Sunday sessions on the terrace. 

It’s been a BIG year for women’s sport in Australia – a little thing called the FIFA Women’s World Cup attracted pretty much the whole entire country to stadiums and TV screens to see the Matildas smash records and touch hearts. It was the coolest thing to happen for women’s sport in this country since record-breaking crowds (86,000 people) packed out the MCG for the women’s T20 World Cup Final back in 2020 BC (as in, Before Covid) – that was the highest ever attendance for a women’s sporting fixture in Australia, and the second highest attendance worldwide. The event proved to the naysayers that Australia does indeed have a big appetite for women’s cricket, and women’s sport in general.  

This summer is set to be a summer like no other and Domaine Chandon gets it. Recognising our need for a weekend getaway and a tipple, it's that time of the year again for the much-loved winery's Garden Spritz Picnics: a chance to sit back, soak up the sun and sip the day away.

Ever wanted to learn more about wine, minus the snobbery and big egos that come with so many elevated tasting events? You’re in luck. The brand new team at Good Booze Blind are offering a series of guided journeys, designed to welcome you into the world of wine (even if you're a complete newbie) and help you become more confident in your vino preferences. 

If you've had the pleasure of ducking into Heidelberg West's UGO Cucina Popolare before, you'll know these folks know how to craft a damn good sanga. Purveyors of perfect panini and A-grade coffee since 2020, the beloved café has now brought its Italian lunch magic to the Northside in the form of a summer pop-up that will run until the end of the season. Fantastico!

On the same day Julia Fox strutted through the streets wearing a corset emblazoned with a young Princess Diana (see the iconic picture here if you haven't already), an exhibition all about the people's princess was announced to be making its Australian debut in Melbourne.

We're just as sad as you are that cherry blossom season is over, but the good news is that it heralds the start of the cherry-picking season. And if you can't get enough of those sweet and juicy red morsels, then make your way to CherryHill Orchards this summer to pick and eat as many cherries as your heart desires.

This year, the cherry-picking season will kick off on November 8 at CherryHill's 40-hectare orchard in Coldstream. Then, on November 27, CherryHill's original orchard in Wandin East will also open its gates to eager pickers. 

Birrarung Marr will transform into a fragrant hawker-style market this November, providing Melburnians with the perfect opportunity to gather with friends outdoors, get amongst the bustle and most importantly – eat! 

Across the sea of vendors that will set up shop over the 18-night foodie fest, visitors can expect truckloads of authentic Asian delicacies like skewers, zesty salads, loaded bao, oodles of noodles and, of course, dumplings. And lots of 'em, too. 

Dickens' A Christmas Carol is returning to the Melbourne stage. Set for a pre-Christmas season from November 12 to January 7, the smash hit staging of the timeless holiday story will be playing at the Comedy Theatre. 

A Christmas Carol was the most-awarded play of 2021, sweeping the Tonys with five award wins. Two Tony Award winners themselves created the magical rendition: director Matthew Warchus (Matilda the Musical) and playwright Jack Thorne (Harry Potter and the Cursed Child). The production delivers striking staging, moving storytelling and 12 traditional Christmas carols, including ‘Joy to the World’ and ‘Silent Night’.

“City arts people. Gullible as fuck.” It’s hard not to chuckle, as a Melbourne-based critic, when listening to this acidic aside during a drug deal chat playing out in the carpeted and wood-panelled pub of Hope Hill, the ‘haunted’ town that houses Malthouse’s latest immersive theatre offering Hour of the Wolf.

You may think that being made to do the heavy lifting – pursuing a story on foot, following loose threads that diverge – is a mug’s game. But suppose you dug the Southbank institution’s lockdown-interrupted blockbuster Because the Night, the more recent undersea antics of Love Lust Lost or were lucky enough to catch Sleep No More in NYC. In that case, you’re likely happily ‘gullible’.

CERES is sowing the seeds of love this spring and summer, inviting Melbourne singles to get a little grubby in the garden while meeting new people. If you've got a green thumb and are looking for a special someone to share your veggie patch with, then ditch the dating apps and grab a shovel to get digging. 

Ever wondered where Melbourne florists get their gorgeous peonies from? There’s a good chance they get them from Romswood, a working peony farm that you'll find in the picturesque town of Kerrie in the Macedon Ranges.

Located about an hour from inner city Melbourne, Romswood Peony Farm is currently in the height of blooming season and the farmers have decided to hold a couple of peony-picking days for the general public. Visitors will be able to explore the gardens and wander through fields and fields of gorgeous peonies, picking your own bunch to take home with you.

It’s 1963 in San Francisco. On the eve of their deployment to a developing conflict in Vietnam, a gaggle of young Marines embark on one final night of debauchery. But when Corporal Eddie Birdlace meets the idealistic waitress Rose Fenny, everything changes, and Eddie’s perspective on life and love evolves as the night draws on.

From Academy Award-winning composers and lyricists Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (La La Land, Dear Evan Hansen) comes Dogfight, a Theatrical production that will be brought to Melbourne audiences at Chapel Off Chapel directed by Pip Mushin (Midnight, the Book of Mormon). 

The mark Billie Holiday left on the history of jazz music was indelible. From being the first African American woman to work with an all-white band to her haunting rendition of the song 'Strange Fruit' which later became one of the first protest songs for the Civil Rights Movement, 'Lady Day' was nothing short of a trailblazer. And now, a musical play about her life is taking to the stage at Arts Centre Melbourne's Fairfax Studio. Running until December 2, Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill stars the award-winning Zahra Newman as Billie Holiday and features her greatest hits such as 'Strange Fruit' to 'I'll be Seeing You' and 'What a Little Moonlight Can Do.'

There are few voices more recognisable and beloved than that of Sir David Attenborough's. For decades now, the famous British biologist's dulcet tones have accompanied countless incredible documentaries showcasing the wonders of the planet we call home.  

A new immersive audiovisual experience from BBC Earth will transport you inside one of those documentaries at the Melbourne Convention Centre this year. Stepping in, you'll be surrounded by massive multi-angle screens playing a documentary from one of BBC Studios' award-winning natural history series, Seven Worlds, One Planet. 

If you had 30 minutes to spend with yourself surrounded by nothing but darkness and the rain, what would you do? This is something the Rain Room by luxe hotel Jackalope and London-based collective Random International wants us to consider. The exhibition has reopened its sliding doors for its third season and invites us to all take a moment for ourselves to practice mindfulness and embrace the present in the rain.

Summer calls for opulent seafood feasts and special occasions shared with friends. It's time to gather a crew, get your hands dirty and dig into the best of the catch! Australia's native crabs – mud crabs or 'muddies' as they're affectionately called – are now in season, and so Crown's home to regional Chinese fare Spice Temple is getting in on all the action with their luxurious $99 live mud crab feasts. 

As a war correspondent and photographer for Vogue, model-turned-photographer Lee Miller sat at the epicentre of a number of epochal events. From the liberation of Paris and the battle of Saint-Malo to the liberation of both the Dachau and Buchenwald concentration camps, Miller's photographs serve as pieces of history. And now you have the chance to see her works in the flesh. Officially opening on November 4, Surrealist Lee Miller will be showing at the Heide Museum of Modern Art. Curated by Miller’s son Anthony Penrose, the exhibition will feature 100 works. 

Cameron Mackintosh’s award-winning production of Boublil and Schönberg’s Miss Saigon will hit Her Majesty's Theatre this October, in partnership with Opera Australia. 

Inspired by the 1904 opera Madama Butterfly – which Opera Australia brought back to Handa Opera on the Harbour in March to critical acclaim – Miss Saigon has become one of the most successful musicals in history since its premiere in London in 1989. The original Broadway production of Miss Saigon opened in 1991 and went on to play for nearly ten years.

Melbourne’s brimming with fabulous high tea experiences, but now there’s a new one you need to add to your rotation. Call your nan, your girlfriends, or whoever else it is you ferry along with you to fulfil your highest high tea fantasies, and get your names on the list right away.

The Melbourne Marriott Hotel on the corner of Exhibition and Lonsdale Street has announced an exquisite New York style high tea, designed to delight and bedazzle your taste buds all afternoon long. Perfect for two, the three-tied stand is offering a selection of cold and warm dishes, plus handmade pastries and desserts. 

The high tea will take place daily from noon to 3pm until the end of the year at the hotel’s signature restaurant, The Essence. Inspired by the hotel’s American roots, Marriott Melbourne’s head chef Swami Nanden is bringing Big Apple classics to the table and infusing them with a local Melbourne twist. Think traditional baked raspberry cheesecake, mac and cheese croquettes with sweet mustard pickle, mustard mayo, and mouthwatering pastrami and sauerkraut bagels. Swami has worked in some of the world’s most famous restaurants, Michelin-starred Benares Mayfair, Noma and Gordon Ramsay at Claridge’s. 

“It’s about creating delicious morsels that look and taste amazing,” Swami said. “So many people eat with their eyes – plus, we live in an Instagram age – which is why we’ve paid particular attention to detail and the aesthetic appearance of these dishes.”

Forget about exxy flights to NYC, because this dazzling array of savouries and sweets will take you there through taste. Other highlights on the menu include cucumber, avocado and cream cheese sangas on granary bread, Bahamian lobster sliders and melt-in-your-mouth chicken and leek pithivier pies. If you’re a sweet tooth, you’ll be all over the espresso martini cake, cereal milk panna cotta with cornflake crunch and mini choux pastry eclairs. 

And of course, a high tea isn’t a high tea without scones, so here you’ll be served them freshly baked with strawberry jam and fresh cream. The package also includes bottomless barista-brewed coffee and leaf tea, such as green tea with lychee and ginger, rose with French vanilla, Italian almond, peppermint and more. 

Per head, the experience costs $59 without alcohol, $70 if you’d like a tipple of King Valley prosecco, $75 for a glass of Yarra Valley Chandon Brut instead, or $79 for a fun New York-inspired cocktail. 

Ready to get your luxe Manhattan fix? Go to the website.

Pining for pastries? These are the best patisseries in Melbourne. And for more fun high tea experiences, check out our round-up of the city's best. 

Experience the wonders of Aranda Country in Mparntwe/Alice Springs, through one hundred beatific watercolours at the free NGV exhibition Watercolour Country: 100 works from Hermannsburg. 

Running from October 27–April 14, 2024, at the Ian Potter Centre, the exhibition threads together watercolours made by Aranda, Western Aranda, Eastern Aranda and Kemarre/Loritja artists working in the Indigenous community of Ntaria/Hermannsburg across the generations. 

Among the artworks is a new acquisition by Albert Namatjira, who is regarded as of Australia's most prolific artists, after he found fame through his pioneering landscapes of the Central Australian outback. The exhibition also features contemporary artists Benita Clements and the likes of Gerhard Inkamala and Cordula Ebatarinja – one of the only women to have a career as a painter during the boom period of the Hermannsburg School. 

Whether it's far-flung eucalyptus trees, slender ghost gums or jagged rock formations, Watercolour Country: 100 works from Hermannsburg spotlights the wild beauty of not only Aranda Country but the stories etched within.

Discover more about the upcoming exhibition by visiting the NGV website here.

Feeling inspired? Why not check out some of the best art, craft and life drawing classes in Melbourne.

After such an incredible World Cup campaign, the Matildas have brought football to the front of Australia’s collective consciousness. If you're not ready to shrug off the excitement and passion that the beautiful game brings, the good news is that you don’t have to. 

The league that every Matilda once played in is starting back up for the 2023/24 season and, with season passes cheaper than a new pair of cleats, there’s no excuse not to get behind the new generation of female footballers in the Liberty A-League.

Traversing time and space, Wurrdha Marra is a new exhibition celebrating the diversity of First Nations art and design. From October 12, the ground floor and foyer of the Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia will become a dynamic and ever-changing exhibition space that displays masterpieces and never-before-shown works from the NGV’s First Nations collection.

Calling all dancing queens, the jukebox musical to rival all jukebox musicals is voulez vous-ing its way back to Melbourne in October and November for a strictly limited season. You’d have to have lived under a rock since the mid-2010s not to have a passing awareness of Mamma Mia! Critics may be divided, but the 65 million tickets sold worldwide are a testament to the popularity of this smash-hit phenomenon – let alone the two box office smashing movies it inspired.

Who is Elvis? Obviously, we know who he was – an impossibly handsome young lad with the crooner’s voice who gyrated into rock stardom before choking on his own excess. But what does he mean to us now? Is he a figure of cultural appropriation, a white guy made good on the shoulders of black artists? A cautionary example of capitalist indulgence, the music industry’s archetypal Icarus? Or a symbol of class aspiration and the transformative power of fame, the poor man risen to the greatest pinnacle of celebrity?

Elvis: A Musical Revolution seems for a while to have a bet each way, before coming down hard on the latter reading, succumbing eventually to the starry-eyed wonder of the besotted fan, dazzled by the light of genius. This Elvis can be dismissive, rude and narcissistic but the portrait painted here is ultimately hagiographic; his journey pointedly ends not in the bloated chintz of his Vegas years, but the triumph of his ’68 Comeback special. There is not a single mention of drugs or liquor, food or death.

In the role of the King, Rob Mallett has an unenviable task: how to embody the look, moves and sound of Elvis the performer without bringing to mind whole generations of Elvis impersonators, that tacky wave of 'dodgy uncles in polyester jumpsuits' we try to avoid at weddings. While he doesn’t really ever look the part – there’s a strange resemblance to Crispin Glover’s 'cool phase' George McFly in Back to the Future – he does sound like him. Elvis’s baritone was richer than Mallett’s, and his inflections more natural, but overall it’s a solid approximation.

Mallett also works hard to show Elvis’s lighter, more charming side; he often comes across as goofy and sincere, a man buffeted by the vagaries of fame and fortune, even slightly infantilised. An abrupt shift into raging megalomania is poorly handled, but this is largely the fault of Sean Cercone and David Abbinanti’s book, which has a tendency to lurch from one biographical moment to another. Like most musicals of this ilk, it’s frustratingly episodic and superficial.

The book’s other glaring problem is its fondness for glibness and cliché. Elvis’s mum Gladys (an otherwise excellent Noni McCallum) is depicted as a saintly figure, dispensing old-world wisdom and then dying from an excrescence of sentiment. Colonel Parker (Ian Stenlake) is the hard-headed and grubby promoter. Priscilla (Annie Chiswell) is criminally underwritten, required to do little more than look miserable and complain about Ann-Margaret (Kirby Burgess, threatening to walk off with the whole show). Structurally, it functions as a dream play, time periods sliding and coalescing, Elvis’s childhood returning over and over as a reminder and admonishment. If only the producers didn’t feel the need to signpost everything, projecting the dates onto the set as if we couldn’t figure it out for ourselves.

Intriguingly, Elvis works best when it abandons storytelling for music making, when it leans into its jukebox roots. The scenes depicting Presley’s movies – all those dreadful plots and cheesy settings, the greedy churn of them one after another – are a production highlight. So are the gospel-inflected numbers sung by Charlie Williams, Jo-Anne Jackson and Joti Gore. And the ’68 special, where the king finally busts out in that iconic leather jumpsuit, is terrifically entertaining, an orgiastic Elvis love-in.

The production design is sharp and effective, from Isaac Lummins' costumes and Dan Potra’s set, to the excellent lighting from Declan O’Neill, which recreates the giant red Elvis in lights from the television special. Michael Ralph’s choreography is often jaw-dropping, and the ensemble throw themselves into it with precision and gusto. Director Alister Smith keeps the whole show running smoothly and the energy levels exhaustingly high, but he could afford more introspection and nuance. The fifties dance numbers become tiresome after a while, and some of the period trappings feel dangerously close to pastiche. Sometimes, even in a musical about Elvis, less is more.

Elvis: A Musical Revolution doesn’t seem to be associated in any way with Baz Luhrmann’s recent biopic, but it does feel highly indebted to it. The downplaying of Presley’s most grotesque extravagances is more pronounced, and the character of the Colonel less of a nightmarish phantom from some fever dream, but the essential goodness of Elvis and his unassailable place in music history remains the same. Jukebox musicals like this play slavishly to an already established fan base, and this one is no different. If you’re looking for trouble, or anything that might challenge a legacy, you’ve come to the wrong place.

'Elvis: A Musical Revolution' is playing at the Athenaeum Theatre until December 24. To book tickets, head to the website.

Want more? Check out the best of Melbourne theatre and musicals this month.

Spring calls for road trips to the picturesque Yarra Valley, and this year there's no better pit stop than the granddaddy of all wineries, Domaine Chandon. The premium sparkling wine producer has launched a series of unique vino tastings just in time for the warmer months, designed to immerse you in the sophisticated world of top-tier bubbly. Set amidst the lush rolling hills and vines of Chandon's estate, you'll be treated to stunning panoramic views of the Yarra Valley, plus your choice of a curated tasting experience.

The AFLW is back for an eighth season, which will run from September to December this year. The action kicks off on September 1 with reigning premiers Melbourne taking on Collingwood at Princes Park. The jam-packed first weekend will continue with a historic clash between Hawthorn and Essendon in Frankston. The season will be made up of ten rounds of home-and-away matches followed by a finals series featuring the top eight clubs, with the grand final scheduled for December 3. Tickets to all 10 rounds are on sale now online, with adult general admission a budget-friendly $10 and free entry for fans under 18. You can find a detailed schedule of the 2023 season here.

From two veritable Lego masterminds (and winners of the hit reality TV show competition) comes a unique and playful exhibition, combining intricate Lego creations with antique artefacts. Relics: A New World Rises is the latest exhibition at Melbourne Museum that combines large-scale LEGO creations with vintage treasures to create an innovative spectacle. 

Grab your besties and get ready to pivot your way down to the District Docklands, because everyone’s favourite '90s sitcom is setting up shop in Melbourne. The Friends Experience is making its Down Under debut on September 1, so you and your pals will soon be able to relive unforgettable moments from the show, for the ‘gram or just for the mems. 

Who is conceptual art for, and who gets to make it? With a commitment to exploring the complexity of identity, championing the “other” and “blackening of the conceptual art canon”, artist Newell Harry might just alter your perception. Esperanto, the artist's largest solo project to date, is now open at the Murray Art Museum Albury (MAMA), and it's the perfect calling card to prompt you to make the journey to visit the regional centre of Albury Wodonga and its striking art museum.

A unique exhibition at the Immigration Museum highlights the voices of Australians with diverse racial backgrounds, documenting the experiences of mixed and multi-ethnic families alongside issues of culture and racism. Fam is a nuanced visual showcase that takes photographic portraits of 15 families and sets them against stories of their different lived experiences and perspectives, aiming to destigmatise conversations about race and family. 

Do you believe in freedom, beauty, truth and love? Yes? Good, because 'Moulin Rouge! The Musical' is making a spectacular return to the Regent Theatre on August 20. The Australian cast is led by Alinta Chidzey as Satine and Des Flanagan as Christian. The role of Moulin Rouge proprietor, Harold Zidler, will be filled by Simon Burke while the villainous Duke of Monroth is played by James Bryers. Tickets are now on sale via the website.

Scienceworks invites visitors to explore Earth and the cosmos with a series of after-hours and adults-only film screenings on the huge Planetarium dome, with a drink in hand. Every Friday night, those over 18 can explore the universe through immersive documentaries and wonder at the magic of the universe. You won’t go spacing out at these shows either, as they’re loaded with amazing visuals and stellar content.

While a good number of Melbourne laneways are already filled with art, eateries, and hidden bars, there are a fair few that are lesser known and haven’t reached their full laneway potential, until now. Supported by the City of Melbourne, Flash Forward is Melbourne’s most ambitious street art project, with over 40 large-scale works commissioned and set to hit the laneways of Melbourne. Among the program are familiar names like Celeste Mountjoy (filthyratbag), Jarra Karralinar Steel, Olana Janfa, Aretha Brown, DREZ, and Ling, with more lighting, music and creative installations in the works. Find out more on the website. 

Experience the sights and sounds of Australia’s First Nations artists like never before with Connection, the latest immersive experience at the Lume. Opening on June 23, get ready to step inside the iridescent world of First Peoples art and culture, displayed on a scale that needs to be seen to be believed. Spanning 3,000 square metres of gallery space, Connection will feature projections four storeys high and an awe-inspiring display of original art.

Whether you’re yet to grace restaurateur Chris Lucas’ opulent Society with a visit or you’re a die-hard dinnertime loyalist, it’s well worth a look in for a weekend lunch. From Friday to Sunday in the afternoons, the swish restaurant is hosting the Society Social, an extravagant multi-course affair featuring a generous array of savoury dishes and a roving dessert trolley to dazzle you at the end. 

What better way to hold a mirror up to society than with an exhibition of pictures reflecting our innermost thoughts and feelings? Mirror: New views on photography is a free exhibition at the State Library Victoria featuring 141 images from the photography collection that explores and expands on the meditative theme of ‘mirror’.

Lovers of the written word rejoice; a free exhibition over at the State Library Victoria is spotlighting the history of book design, production and illustration from the Middle Ages to the present day. World of the Book features more than 300 rare, remarkable, historically significant items in the State Collection, each unravelling a unique story from its pages. 

Get ready to go on a journey through living light when Sea Life Melbourne Aquarium unveils its new interactive digital experience in mid-February. 

Marking the major attraction’s first foray into this ever-evolving art form, Submerged is inspired by the bioluminescent underwater world and will tell the story of the mysterious firefly squid (which emits a glowing blue light from its body) and other majestic ocean creatures. The exhibition will also explore magical locations such as a glittering shoreline in the midst of spawning season and a moonlit deep dive into the depths of the bioluminescent unknown.

Suitable for all ages, Submerged will run until December 2023 while the 2.2 million litre Oceanarium undergoes a massive renovation. During this time, the larger sharks and rays will not be on display – but rest assured there will still be thousands of marine animals and freshwater animals to discover during your visit. 

“As one of Melbourne’s top tourist attractions, we are excited to be diving into new depths with the launch of Submerged," says Claire Burrell, general manager of Sea Life Melbourne. “The digital experience will captivate guests with its vibrance and hyperrealism, providing them with an alternative but no less engaging ocean experience while our Oceanarium is upgraded.”

Access to Submerged is included in the price of your admission and will be open to the public until December 2023. For more information, head to the website.

ICYMI: three adorable baby elephants were just born at Melbourne Zoo – and you can now see them!

Have you ever wanted to walk the hallowed halls that once housed notorious criminals like Ned Kelly and Mark 'Chopper' Read? Well, soon you'll have your chance: the historic Pentridge Prison in Coburg is reopening for public tours this month. 

Catherine Martin's costumes from Baz Luhrmann's acclaimed movie Elvis have arrived at the National Film and Sound Archive in Canberra, joining the exhibition Australians and Hollywood as a major drawcard.

This tour of Victoria’s most history-steeped seaport will take you through abandoned morgues and forgotten burial grounds, as well as streets once frequented by convicts and drunken sailors. These days though, these alleys are home to far more apparitions. Book via Lantern Ghost Tours.