The Big Mushroom

Balingup, Western Australia, Australia

Roadside giants

Current – limited access

Checked by Project Big Things · Aug 2026

This Big Thing is still here, but public access is limited. Check the access notes for details before visiting.

A giant mushroom sculpture in the grounds of the Old Cheese Factory at Balingup.

Limited access
Check the access notes for details before visiting

Private to your Passport.

PLAN YOUR VISIT

No recommended arrival yet

We have not checked a recommended place to arrive or stop here yet.

This takes you to the Big Thing itself. If stopping, choose a safe and legal place nearby.

The Big Mushroom

This pin marks the Big Thing itself. If stopping, choose a safe and legal place nearby.

33.78859° S, 115.97637° E

FIELD GUIDE

The story

A giant mushroom in the grounds of a former cheese factory, in a valley town best known for its tulips and its scarecrows.

Balingup sits in the Blackwood Valley in Western Australia's South West, a small place with an unusually strong streak of the whimsical – it runs a long-established medieval carnivale and a small farm fair, and the surrounding district trades on craft, produce and an alternative reputation dating back to the 1970s. A giant mushroom fits that character precisely, and would look eccentric almost anywhere else.

The Old Cheese Factory, on the Nannup-Balingup Road, is the host. Repurposed rural industrial buildings are a common home for these objects – the space exists, the frontage exists, and a new business occupying an old factory has an obvious interest in being noticed.

Mushrooms are a good sculptural subject for reasons beyond the shape. They arrive overnight, they belong to damp shaded country of exactly the kind the Blackwood Valley has, and they carry an inescapable association with fairy tales that makes an oversized one read as whimsical rather than merely large. Very few oversized objects get that for free.

Current Western Australian Big Things lists continue to identify the mushroom at the Old Cheese Factory, and business and local tourism sources confirm the venue remains operating at 16 Nannup-Balingup Road.

Because it stands in the grounds of an operating business rather than on public land, access follows the venue. Its maker, date, size and materials are not recorded.

Balingup also sits on the South Western Highway between Donnybrook and Bridgetown, so the mushroom catches traffic heading down to the karri country and the Blackwood River. That through-route is why a town of a few hundred can support the venues it does.

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PRACTICAL

Plan your stop

WHAT TO EXPECT

Current 2025-26 WA Big Things lists continue to identify the Big Mushroom at the Old Cheese Factory, and current business/local tourism sources confirm the Old Cheese Factory remains operating at 16 Nannup-Balingup Road.

ACCESS

The sculpture is on private commercial property. It is visible from the roadside, but public entry/parking specifically for the sculpture should not be assumed without current venue confirmation.

COMMUNITY

Visitor Log

WHAT'S NEXT

Find another Big Thing nearby

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Current

The Big Peg – Bridgetown

Bridgetown, Western Australia

An oversized timber clothes peg outside Bridgetown Repertory Theatre.

Public art

24 km away

TRANSPARENCY

Sources & research

Brown Signs – Big Mushroom

Brown Signs · recorded 2026-08-22

Community

The Old Cheese Factory current business listing

Google business listing · recorded 2026-08-22

Other

WA Things of Interest 2026

Kaylene Kirkpatrick · recorded 2026-08-22

Community

What we're still checking

The sculpture is on private commercial property; a preferred visitor parking/viewing point has not yet been independently confirmed.

Open-licence image search completed 24 August 2026. No defensible reusable image with file-level commercial-use provenance was verified in the completed Commons, government/open-licence and archival/open-collection sweep.

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