Edifício Esther

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Edifício Esther

The Edifício Esther is a residential and office building at Praça da República 64 to 80 in downtown São Paulo . The building, designed by Álvaro Vital Brazil and Adhemar Marinho , was built between 1936 and 1938 and is considered the first building of modern architecture in Brazil . Because of this unique selling point, the Edifício Esther is well known and is now a listed building by the city and state of São Paulo.

history

A new headquarters for the Esther sugar mill

In the early 1930s, the industrialist Paulo de Almeida Nogueira , owner of the Esther sugar mill ( Usina Açucareira Esther ) wanted a representative building in the economic metropolis of São Paulo. Until now, the sugar mill had its headquarters in Cosmópolis , in the interior of the state of São Paulo. With the construction, the Nogueira family wanted to underline their importance for the state's economy and to strengthen the industrialization and modernization process of the metropolis with one of the city's first high-rise projects. As a patron, the family had previously financed urbanization projects in the city, including the construction of avenues.

Planning a multifunctional high-rise

Facade detail
Detail of the sides facing the glazed staircase

As the owner, Paulo de Almeida Nogueira designed a “closed competition” so that architects could submit their designs based on his wishes: Nogueira's wish was that the building should not only be the headquarters of his sugar mill, but also include the apartment and offices of other companies . The construction should finance itself through the rental income. Between 1932 and 1934 Nogueira personally contacted numerous architects between São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro to invite them to his competition. According to today's findings, Nogueira ultimately only received two designs: A classic three-part design by Oswaldo Arthur Bratke , more in the style of the 1910s . As well as a modern design by the two architects Álvaro Vital Brazil and Adhemar Marinho , which Nogueira finally decided on in 1934. It is not known whether there were any further submissions, as the Esther Zuckermühle archive burned down in 1975.

The design by Vital Brazil and Marinho comprised an eleven-story high-rise in the form of a large parallelepiped with horizontal windows, and cylindrical staircases with glass on both short sides. The project, which comprised eleven floors, presented a floor plan with flexible rooms made up of continuous floors, so that the work modules, halls and offices could be changed afterwards depending on the space requirements.

According to the wishes of the owner and with the architecture inspired by the ideals of the Bauhaus, Vital Brazil and Adhemar Marinho tried to create a multifunctional building in which urban life could be reproduced: living, work and leisure united in a single building. It was an innovative project for the time: the eleven floors were in contrast to the neighboring buildings that did not extend beyond the third floor - the building upwards, in Portuguese verticalização , was a symbol of its modernity.

Vital Brazil showed early on his fondness for architectural rationalism under the influence of big names in architecture such as Frank Lloyd Wright and Le Corbusier . His design emphasized the open spaces and tried to create opportunities for exchange and to emphasize the communication between the inside and the outside of the building: this also included terrace gardens, adjoining windows, the geometric facade in black and straw yellow complete the set. Some of the apartments were given an area of ​​up to 400 square meters. In the common rooms, the floors and walls were decorated with marble. The way of construction was also new, with economical use of materials and construction methods and with few external decorations. Technical necessity and aesthetics should go hand in hand.

Inauguration on April 9, 1938

The inauguration of the building took place on April 9, 1938 at 11:30 a.m. According to the diary of the owner Nogueira, there was no celebration, only a Christian consecration of the building by Father Giovanni, priest of the nearby Igreja de Santa Cecília , is said to have taken place.

For administration purposes, Nogueira founded his own company in 1942, the Sociedade Predial Esther, which was also responsible for the maintenance and cleanliness of the building. This form of property management was only possible through a new tenancy law ( Decreto-lei 4598 of August 20, 1942, known as "Lei do Inquilinato").

The plan of the owner Nogueira: The result was a house with many different rooms and functions: The ground floor was lined with large shops, the employees of the sugar mill moved in on the first, second and third floors. The fourth floor received apartments with one and two bedrooms; the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth floor apartments with two or three bedrooms with kitchen and maids room. The ninth and tenth floors received four two-story apartments. The last floor was occupied by two roof apartments surrounded by terraces.

Center of the Paulistani Bohème

After the inauguration, the Edifício Esther developed into a meeting place for the upper class of São Paulo. From the 1940s writers, journalists, painters and artists began to live there. Famous residents welcomed celebrities both in the attic, where there was a rose garden, and in the basement, where celebrities celebrated together in the Privê Club that existed there . The well-known residents of the house included the architect Rino Levi , who lived in offices on the second floor and one of the two-story apartments on the ninth floor, number 901, from 1941 to 1944. Other well-known tenants in the building were the artist couple Emiliano Di Cavalcanti and Noêmia Mourão , the journalist Marcelino de Carvalho , the businessman David Aroushan , the VASP pilot Irineu Fernandes, the American flight instructor Melvin Goecke and the film critic Francisco Luiz de Almeida Salles . The latter lived in the house until well into the 1980s, he told the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper that the best thing about the house was the view of the Praça da República.

In particular the artist couple Emiliano Di Cavalcanti and Noêmia Mourão and the journalist Marcelino de Carvalho are said to have celebrated extravagant parties in the house. Numerous romantic adventures are said to have taken place in the small apartments at the ends of the floors: numerous Paulistani of the upper class are said to have rented rooms there - in a very discreet way - for a few hours and days. Neither the owners nor the other residents of the house are said to have been bothered by it, as elevators 1 and 5 led directly to these apartments and so the alternating visit should not have caused a stir.

But not only the tenants of the house shaped the importance of the house, other historical events also took place here: Among other things, the Instituto de Arquitetos do Brasil (IAB, Institute of Architects of Brazil) was founded in the house in 1941 1944 also moved into own rooms. The Clube dos Amigos da Arte ("Clubinho") was also founded there. The first meetings for the founding of the television channel TV Cultura also took place in the Prédio Esther.

Sale and Expiry

In the 1960s, numerous important institutions of São Paulo’s cultural life moved away from the Praça da República , where the house was located, and more towards Avenida Paulista . The owner of the sugar mill, Paulo de Almeida Nogueira, had since passed away, and his son, Paulo Nogueira Filho, had left the family business and turned to writing. The third generation of nogueiras, the two brothers Paulo Nogueira Neto and José Bonifácio Coutinho Nogueira, ran the sugar mill.

For economic reasons, i.e. to create capital for the modernization of the company, the brothers moved the headquarters of the sugar mill back to Cosmópolis, in the interior of the state of São Paulo, in 1965. The brothers also sold all of Edifício Esther's apartments and offices individually and closed the house's management company founded by their grandfather. This is said to have posed great challenges for numerous tenants - now owners, as the management company had previously taken on all the tasks for the house, which now fell back on the owners. The decline of the building was accompanied by a general decline in downtown São Paulo, and the center lost its attractiveness and attention. The building was later fenced in to prevent homeless people from entering.

Monument protection

In the 1980s, the building threatened to be demolished. In 1990 the Monument Protection Council of the State of São Paulo ( Condephaat ) put the house under monument protection and thus prevented it from being demolished. In 1992, the municipal monument protection council of the city of São Paulo ( Conpresp ) followed.

However, the Veja magazine found that the Edifício Esther was poorly preserved due to the different ownership structures - in contrast to Edifício Caetano de Campos, which is also under monument protection and state administration directly opposite. As of 2020, the building houses 94 offices, 18 condominiums, a mosque and a French restaurant on the roof terrace.

bibliography

  • Fernando Atique: Ensinando a morar: o Edifício Esther e os embates pela habitaçãovertical em São Paulo (1930–1962) , in: Risco Revista de Pesquisa em Arquitetura e Urbanismo . No. 2, July 1, 2005, pp. 38-55. ( available online )
  • Maria Lúcia Bressan Pinheiro: Arquitetura residencial verticalizada em São Paulo nas décadas de 1930 e 1940, in: Anais do Museu Paulista . Volume 16. No. 1, January 2008, pp. 109-149. ( available online )

Web links

Commons : Edifício Esther  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i Fernando Atique: Ensinando a morar: o Edifício Esther e os embates pela habitação vertical em São Paulo (1930-1962) . In: Risco Revista de Pesquisa em Arquitetura e Urbanismo (online) . No. 2 , July 1, 2005, ISSN  1984-4506 , p. 38–55 , doi : 10.11606 / issn.1984-4506.v0i2p38-55 ( usp.br [accessed June 2, 2020]).
  2. ↑ levati: História do Edifício Esther - O primeiro prédio mixed use do país. In: Marketing Imobiliário - Marketingimob. Retrieved June 16, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Gabinete do Secretário: Resolução SC-25, de 24-8-90. (PDF) In: DOE, Poder Executivo, Seção I. August 25, 1990, accessed on June 1, 2020 (Portuguese).
  4. ↑ http://www.ipatrimonio.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Edif%C3%ADcio-Esther-conpresp.pdf
  5. ↑ Prédios na Praça da República seguem trajetórias opostas. Retrieved June 16, 2020 (American English).
  6. ↑ O primeiro Multiuso revive locação - São Paulo. Retrieved June 16, 2020 (Brazilian Portuguese).

Coordinates: 23 ° 32 ′ 40.7 ″  S , 46 ° 38 ′ 33.7 ″  W.