The Metropolitan Cathedral of Rio de Janeiro and the Brasilia Cathedral

!architecture to finish my Brazilian posting of weird architecture.

This is the Metropolitan Cathedral of Rio de Janeiro, it was built between 1964-1979 and it was designed by architect Edgar de Oliveira da Fonseca. Some say he was inspired by the maya pyramids , others that he was inspired by the Apollo program

The Cathedral is 75 meters tall (246ft) and 106 meters of diameter (348ft). The internal height is of 64 meters (210ft).

Interior of the cathedral

Statue of John Paul II

A statue of homeless Jesus

Bonus now from the Cathedral of Brasilia

The Metropolitan Cathedral of Our Lady of Aparecida. Designed by Oscar Niemeyer and built between 1958 and 1970 under the direction of Structural Engineer Joaquim Cardozo (who also made the structural project pf the cathedral).

The statues represent the 4 evangelists.

That cathedral is not very aesthetic (debatable as Niemeyer won the Pritzker prize for it) but it's very interesting from a !engineering POV. It's a hyperboloid structure composed of 16 hyperbolic-curved pillars made of reinforced concrete, each one weighting 90 metric tons. And 16 sections of glass fiber between the pillars, forming the stained glass, its total surface is of 2,000 sq meters.