From internet:
Ibirapuera Park offers over two million square meters of green space with quite a lot to see and do. There are paths, which wonder beside lagoons and beautiful flowerbeds, a Japanese garden, an exercise trace where you can jog and even a place where you can hire a bike and cycle along the pathways. On Sundays there is a free outdoor concert in the park and a free outdoor lending library where you can borrow magazines or books to read for the duration of the day.

But for architectural travellers the main attraction is the buildings complex designed by Niemeyer in 1954. The complex is composed by five buildings connected through a giant curvaceous concrete roof.

1.Biennal Pavillion
2.OCA (Exhibition Space)
3.Auditorium
4.“Marquise” (Connecting Roof)
5.Administrative Buildings

Note that in the image the auditorium is under construction. It was on the original design, but wasn't built at that time. In 2004, fifty years after the park opening Niemeyer revised the project and the building opened last september.

Adress
Av. Pedro Álvares Cabral, no number

Phone
(0xx11) 5574-5177

Admission is free

How to get there
By car: take the 23 de Maio Avenue and follow the city signs, is very easy
By bus: take the bus 5121 - Santo Amaro at the Republica Square
By metro (http://www.metro.sp.gov.br/ingles/tourism/tetourism.shtml): take the line 2 (green) to Brigadeiro Station. It’s not so close to the park though. :wondering

Well, I was there two weeks ago in a quick trip to visit the Architecture Biennal. If anyone have interest I can post some images of the exhibition itself on another thread. Here I'll try to focus on the buildings.
The kmz file:

This is the Biennal Pavillion. This year it held the Architecture Biennal, next year will be the Art Biennal, and so on...

Another view

It's a loooooooong building :D

Brise close-up

Exterior (and improvised emergency stairs)

External ramps

Entrance, the point where the concrete roof meets the building

Nice supports :rock on: . Now let's walk under the roof

Under the roof there's the MAM (Museum of Modern Art of São Paulo)

Keep going...

If you look through the glass, you can see people eating. That's the museum restaurant.

The museum entrance. Hey, look it's that mobile element again Takesh! :D

Unfortunately it's not allowed to take pictures inside the museum. So let's continue...

The main space of the "big roof"

It gets really crowded at weekends. Skateboarders, In line skaters, bikers, etc

The new auditorium

Another

Side view

The roof and the green area of the park in the back

The OCA is an exhibition space. Used to be the aeronautics museum many years ago.

Approaching to the entrance

And the deception. There was a new exhibition being mounted and I couldn't get in. Not even to take a shot from the door! Blame the guy at the left. :mad:

After so much insisting the guy start following my movements. I tried to sneak by the window opening but he saw and I had to give up... :bang head
Funny situation anyway... :P

This is what I was trying to show you (obviously not my photo)

Now we'll enter the Biennal building

Access ramp

Looking back

Eating area. Not exactly a restaurant.

Don't waste your money here. It's expensive and crappy food.

Bookshop below

The bookshop

The exhibition space at the ground level

The interior of the building with its ramps and mezzanines is very nice

Instalations on the external patio

The internal ramps

Let's go to the 2nd floor

View of the 2nd floor

:rock on:

São Paulo through the window

The building have stairs and escalators also

Going to the upper floor

Here is where the main exhibitions (Meier, Baeza, Hollein, Gregotti, etc) were

Last one from the inside

It's a big exhibition. When we went out was already night. The OCA again

The pavillion

And the auditorium

Closer

The entrance "tongue" :wondering

Front view

...

Sculpture by Tomie Ohtake in the foyer. Now you know the background of my new avatar :cool:

Ramp access to the auditorium itself

Second disappointment of the day. I could not get in because a rap concert was happening. :(
But you can see more images here (in portuguese):
IBIRAPUERA AUDITORIUM (http://www.arcoweb.com.br/arquitetura/arquitetura634.asp)

oh!!! walking on Ibirapuera Park is a dream! The images tell a little..
viva Oscar Niemeyer!

lost for words

great thread!!!! :not worth :not worth

Marvellous lots of thanks

How is the entrance tongue constructed ?

Wow Digdoi! thanks for this one! A friend was telling me the other day about that hugh space under the building with "relatively" small pilotis, that people use to skate and byke, away from the burning sun and with a nice crossing brezze... :rock on:

Well, that's the good thing about free ground floors in Brazil. The climate makes them a very desirable place and are often used by lots of people. On the other hand in places like Buenos Aires they're not as good since you would have only a couple months a year you would prefer being under a shadow to sun. I don't know of any open ground floor building that works nicely here.

Apart from that digdoi you're our Niemeyer reference from now on. Not only you have provided us with lots of pictures and information but also they're great and portray his architecture in a beautiful way.
Thank you very much.

Victório
Indeed. By the way you live in São Paulo right? How about take some nice pictures of the things I couldn't and post here? :wondering
And the invite is for all other brazilian pushpullers around!

SWANK-E
Now you can have a little idea of what to see whenever you come to Brazil. ;)

ReD
You're welcome. The "tongue" is a metalic structure.

Primo
It seems even bigger being there! :rock on:

Cacapis
Thanks. But I have to say that Brazil is a very large country and you can find many different types of climates here. My city climate for example is much more like Buenos Aires than Rio de Janeiro. We have temperatures below 0° Celsius here very often.

[Primo
It seems even bigger being there! :rock on:

I am shure it is "O MAIOR DO MUNDO !!!"
;)

digdoi, I've seen only now this post, and still crying a litte bit. I Love this place, I worked for an exposition at MAM in 2003, and also saw the montagem of arquitecture biennal. If you like, I've some photos too that can post, not as good as yours, but decent of the interiors. I miss so much sao paulo, what the hell i do live 11000km away from it.. dunno..

bye all
marco