Teatro Popular
A wall that opens up.
Guillermo Arévalo Aucahuasi — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Diego Baravelli — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Diego Baravelli — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Diego Baravelli — CC BY-SA 4.0
The Caminho Niemeyer (Niemeyer Way) is a set of cultural buildings designed by Oscar Niemeyer along Niterói's waterfront, stretching some 11 kilometres from the city centre to Charitas. Work began in January 2002, after the success of the Contemporary Art Museum, making it the second-largest group of his works after Brasília, though some of its projects never left the drawing board. Most of the finished works stand together on the Praça Popular in the centre: the Teatro Popular, with its undulating lines, which seats 380 inside and has a back wall that opens onto the square, so open-air shows can hold up to 20,000; the snail-shaped headquarters of the Oscar Niemeyer Foundation; and the Monument to the Horizon, a small 4.8-metre steel lookout that points your gaze west to the horizon. Walking around the square is free, but many of the cultural buildings are closed or only partly in use, so the visit is mainly about the architecture; pair it with the Contemporary Art Museum at Boa Viagem, the route's best-known stop.
A wall that opens up.
Niemeyer Foundation.
A lookout facing west.
Praça Popular, central Niterói
The square is free to walk around, but many buildings are closed or only partly in use, so the visit is mainly about the architecture.
