Brasília has a first and last name
Behind the most planned city in the world there are people of flesh, bone and courage. Meet those who dreamed, drew, built and sang the capital — and why each of our houses carries one of these names.
Every city has its heroes. Brasília has hers carved in concrete, in garden, in tile and in song. They are people who bet on an idea that seemed impossible — to raise a capital in the middle of nowhere — and who then gave it a soul. To know them is to know the city from the inside.
The founders
Juscelino Kubitschek — the courage
Born in Diamantina, Minas Gerais, JK turned a campaign promise — "fifty years in five" — into the greatest work in Brazil's history. He faced scepticism, debt and the wilderness to deliver Brasília on 21 April 1960. Without his visionary stubbornness, the city wouldn't exist. Two of our houses honour him: Villa Kubitschek and Villa Catetinho — the latter recalls the Catetinho, his first home in the city.
Lúcio Costa — the line
The urban planner who designed the Pilot Plan with a gesture of two crossing axes. He invented the logic of living in Brasília: the superblocks, the human scale, the separation between the monumental and the everyday. The city's architecture begins with him →
Oscar Niemeyer — the curve
The architect of free curves, who gave the capital its eternal symbols: the Cathedral, the Congress, the Alvorada, the Itamaraty. He worked until the age of 104 and is, probably, the best-known Brazilian in the history of world architecture.
The artists who gave it soul
Roberto Burle Marx — the garden
He painted with plants. He turned Brazilian landscaping into art and taught the world to see tropical flora as heritage. The Itamaraty gardens and so many of the city's beds are his. The landscaping guide is dedicated to him →
Athos Bulcão — the colour
He dressed Brasília in tile and relief. His modular panels — repetition that never repeats the same — are in the little church, the airport and dozens of buildings. They are proof that Brazilian modernism had an artist's hand and human warmth.
The soundtrack: the Capital of Rock
After the founders came the voices. In the 1980s, the planned and silent city exploded in sound: Renato Russo and Legião Urbana, Capital Inicial, Plebe Rude, Raimundos and the young Cassia Eller. The restlessness of a generation raised among superblocks became some of the greatest anthems of Brazilian rock. That's why, at Villela Stay, the Suíte do Renato Russo and the Suíte da Cassia Eller keep that memory.
Sleep inside history
It's no coincidence that each of our stays carries one of these names. It's a form of tribute — and of invitation. Gathering your group in a house called Kubitschek, Catetinho or Gran Villela is taking part, for a few days, in this story that is still being written.
