Arms open wide 710 meters above the city, Christ the Redeemer is the symbol of Rio and of Brazil — and, for Mirante’s guests, it is also the neighbor outside the window. Few places in the city are as close to the way up.
The statue was inaugurated on October 12, 1931, after nine years of work. It was designed by engineer Heitor da Silva Costa with drawings by Carlos Oswald; French sculptor Paul Landowski modeled the figure and Romanian Gheorghe Leonida sculpted the face. The reinforced-concrete structure is clad in a mosaic of thousands of soapstone triangles from Minas Gerais.
It is a 30-meter statue on an 8-meter pedestal, measuring 28 meters from hand to hand. A small chapel to Our Lady of Aparecida sits in its base. In 2007 it was voted one of the New Seven Wonders of the World, and in 2012 it became part of the Rio landscape declared World Heritage by UNESCO.
Beyond the statue, the highlight is the view: the Lagoon, Ipanema and Leblon on one side; Sugarloaf, Botafogo, Downtown, the Rio–Niterói Bridge and Guanabara Bay on the other. The train ride, opened by Emperor Pedro II in 1884, crosses the Tijuca Forest and is an outing in itself.
Tips: buy tickets in advance through official channels, pick a clear day (in the clouds, the statue disappears) and go early, when it is quieter and the light is at its best. Bring a light jacket — it is often windy at the top. Official vans also go up via the Paineiras road.
Official websites: Trem do Corcovado ↗Paineiras Corcovado ↗