This giant cone is baffling at first sight, and that was precisely the point. It's Rio's cathedral, and it took three centuries to arrive.

1A diocese without a home

Rio has been a diocese since 1676 but never had a cathedral of its own: it always made do with borrowed churches, the last being the Antiga Sé on Rua Primeiro de Março. The answer came with the developmentalist drive of the 1960s. It was built between 1964 and 1979, on land left by the razing of Morro de Santo Antônio, and the first Mass was held in 1972.

2A church for 20,000

The design is by the architect Edgar de Oliveira da Fonseca. It measures 106 metres across and 75 metres high, and holds about 20,000 people standing. Its inspiration is debated: some see a Mayan pyramid, others the rockets of the Apollo programme. The circular form, according to its promoters, was meant to express that all the faithful are the same distance from God.

Inside, four stained-glass windows some 60 metres high tint the concrete blue, green, red and yellow as the day goes by.

Pope John Paul II visited in 1980, shortly after it was finished.

3What to look for

  • The four vertical windows meeting at the top to form a cross.
  • The bronze doors with reliefs on the theme of faith.
  • The Lapa Arches, visible from the plaza: they're the next stop.

Documented

It was built between 1964 and 1979 to a design by Edgar de Oliveira da Fonseca and measures 106 metres in diameter and 75 metres in height.

Oral tradition

The inspirations attributed to its shape, a Mayan pyramid or Apollo rockets, are interpretations, not documented statements by the architect.

Sources and credits

Archdiocese of São Sebastião do Rio de Janeiro, cathedral website; Portuguese Wikipedia, «Catedral Metropolitana do Rio de Janeiro»; Centro de Arquitetura e Urbanismo do Rio de Janeiro, architecture guides.

Photos:

  • Rio's cone-shaped concrete Metropolitan Cathedral: Acediscovery, CC BY 4.0.

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