Private Rio: The Great Houses and Gardens

Rio de Janeiro is renowned as one of the world's most alluring and sophisticated cities of exciting high life, but beyond its veil of glamour, the city discreetly conceals a hidden world of history and tradition, artistic treasures, and a solid cultural inheritance unknown to most outsiders. And now, for the first time, this book opens the doors to the great private residences of Rio and its surroundings, giving the reader a privileged view into one of the most alluring places in all of the Americas. Twenty-one of Rio's most captivating homes and their gardens, representative of over 300 years, from colonial times through the monarchy and to the present, grace the pages of Private Rio. While the book illustrates the whole range of Rio's living styles, from townhouses in the city to penthouses high above it, and from beach houses to lavish country homes, each one has been chosen not only because of its obvious physical charm or beauty, but also because it has played a role in the history or in the lives of important personalities of Rio's social, economic, or political evolution. In Paraty, a 350-year-old house facing the ocean is now the home of descendants of the Empeior of Brazil, Prince Dom Joao and Princess Dona Thereza de Orleans e Braganca. In an opposite vein, a modern, minimalist penthouse was designed by architect Aurelio Martinez Flores in the 1980s for Walther and Lucia Moreira Salles on Copacabana beach. On top of a hill in Santa Teresa, the home of the Monteiro de Carvalho family is replete with important Art Nouveau and Art Deco decorative arts -- some custom-designed for the house -- by Galle, Daum, Lalique, Tiffany, and many other artisans. Another house, in the Botafogo district and in the very highest of Parisian Beaux-Arts style, was built as a wedding present for Celina Guinle and Linneo de Paula Machado, who later founded Rio's Jockey Club. And in Ipanema, world-renowned architect Oscar Niemeyer designed a penthouse in 1960 for the president of Brazil, Juscelino Kubitschek. Private Rio pays homage to one of the most beautiful cities in the world, and in its pages many heretofore unseen jewels are unveilded for the first time. Book jacket.