Geoffrey Shedley was a prominent South Australian architect, with a lifelong interest in drawing and sculpture. While a school student at St Peter's, he began art classes at the South Australian School of Art, continuing to attend the school for ten years in all. In 1931, aged 17, he joined an architectural firm; in 1932 he completed a unit in Architectural History at the South Australian School of Mines. Over the next few years he gained a reputation in his firm as a specialist in perspective drawing, while engaging in office highjinks with his old schoolmate, the sculptor John Dowie. Shedley and Dowie went sketching on the weekends, although Shedley's only exterior sign of artiness was his bow tie. He joined the South Australian Housing Trust in 1947, becoming its Chief Design Architect in 1963 and its Project Architect in 1972. During this period he was closely involved in the design of Elizabeth; he designed several of its major buildings and the fountain and gardens for its civic plaza, opened by the Queen in 1963. The plaza is now a carpark and the fountain is in storage; a mural he painted for the Shedley Theatre has also been stored away. After his retirement he designed houses for friends, played the clarinet, grew bonsai and bottled his own wine.
