Capital Letters: Brasília

To take my mind off Matt in Paris (during Thanksgiving!) I’m taking imaginary trips to some other capital cities. First off, Brasília, the spectacular mid-century seat of Brazil. The UNESCO World Heritage Site was planned and developed in 1956 with modern design diety Oscar Niemeyer as the principal architect. The city looks like Mies, Saarinen, Le Corbusier, Eames, and Breuer all took a few more classes and vomited all over a two thousand square mile swath of land.

At the age of 100, Neimeyer is the last living modernist design legend.  The centenarian has been invited by president of Angola to design a new capital city for his country, four times the size of Brasilia. In a recent interview Neimeyer laughs, “Four times the size of Brasilia? So it could take four times as long -That’s 16 years!” If he took the commission he would be 115 years old at the time of its inauguration.

These days Neimeyer is apparently happy to sit around and keep in touch with old friends including Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez. (He’s a member of the Brazilian Communist Party since 1945, and was presented with the Lenin Peace Prize in 1963.)

Brasília became the capital of Brazil in 1960 and is the seat of all three branches of the Brazilian government.

An awesome article on Neimeyer HERE.  More pics after the jump.

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