Avenida Niemeyer

The road

Avenida Niemeyer is the coast road between Leblon and São Conrado. It runs about 4.8 kilometres from the end of Avenida Delfim Moreira, at the western tip of Leblon, around the foot of Morro Dois Irmãos to the Estrada da Gávea in São Conrado, with rock on one side and the Atlantic on the other. Street numbers from 551 to the end of the avenue count as São Conrado and share the postcode 22450-221.

It is one lane in each direction all the way. Plans to widen it were studied in 1994, 1998 and 2010 but never carried out; in 1998 Mayor Luiz Paulo Conde considered elevated lanes over the sea and a tunnel. The road keeps much of the scale of the one that opened in 1916. In light traffic the whole run takes about ten minutes, and at the São Conrado end the coast route carries on westwards over the Elevado do Joá to Barra.

For guests at the villa it is the slow, scenic way into Leblon and Ipanema, while the faster route goes through the Túnel Zuzu Angel. It also carries traffic from Leblon towards Rocinha and São Conrado, and people walk it, fish from it and stop for the sea view. It is worth taking at least once on a clear morning, for the view alone.

Driving it

Heading west from Leblon, the road leaves the beach at the Mirante do Leblon and follows the cliff, with the sea below on your left and the houses of Vidigal on the slope to your right. As you round the hill towards São Conrado, the beach and Pedra da Gávea come into view ahead. It is a road to take slowly, with buses sharing it, and the viewpoints are the places to stop.

Driving back east in the late afternoon, you have the sun behind you and Leblon and Ipanema ahead, lit along the shore. It makes a good road home after a day at the beach.

Viewpoints

The Mirante do Leblon sits at the start of the avenue, on the old Ponta do Leblon, a fishing spot in the 19th century, with Morro Dois Irmãos rising behind it. It looks back along the whole curve of Leblon and Ipanema, and since 2007 it has officially been the Mirante Hans Stern, named after the German-Brazilian jeweller.

Near the São Conrado end is the Gruta da Imprensa, a large natural slab of rock that juts out over the sea, reached by a stairway with a balustrade. It dates from the early 1920s, and its name recalls the Rio press.

Ask your driver before planning a stop, as access can change with works and weather. For photographs, mornings give the best light looking towards São Conrado and late afternoons the best light looking back towards Leblon.

How the road was built

The route began as a railway. In 1891 the Companhia Viação Férrea Sapucaí started cutting a line along these cliffs as part of a planned railway from Botafogo to Angra dos Reis, but the works stopped after about 800 metres. The terrain was difficult and money was short, and pressure from the Companhia de Melhoramentos da Lagoa, the company improving the Lagoa area, helped end the project. The cutting was abandoned for about two decades.

In the early 1910s Charles Armstrong, who ran the Anglo-Brasileiro school at the Chácara do Vidigal, reused the old cutting as a road to the school and extended it by about 400 metres. The aim was to reach Praia da Gávea, as São Conrado beach was then called. The route was finished as a road for cars and inaugurated by Mayor Azevedo Sodré on 20 October 1916, under the name of Conrado Jacob de Niemeyer, the landowner whose estate became the São Conrado neighbourhood. At first it was unpaved and had no guardrails.

The avenue is not named after the architect Oscar Niemeyer (1907 to 2012), who was eight when it opened. His own link to the neighbourhood is the Casa das Canoas, up the Estrada das Canoas in São Conrado, which he designed in 1951 as his family home. The history guide follows the rest of São Conrado's story.

After the opening

The road was soon widened at its curves and paved with macadam for the 1920 visit of King Albert I of Belgium, and a viaduct on it was named after him. Between 1933 and 1954 it was part of the Circuito da Gávea, the street circuit of the Grande Prêmio Cidade do Rio de Janeiro, run on and off in those years and nicknamed the Trampolim do Diabo, the Devil's Springboard.

The racing ended in 1954. The avenue stayed a two-lane road and became the everyday link between Leblon, Vidigal and São Conrado that it is now.

Vidigal

Vidigal climbs the slope of Morro Dois Irmãos above the middle of the avenue, and the avenue is its only road access. It is a bairro in its own right, part of the same Lagoa administrative region as Leblon and São Conrado, with 15,112 residents in 6,729 dwellings in the 2022 census, up 18 percent from 12,797 residents in 2010. It covers 1.6 square kilometres, the smallest area of the seven bairros in that region.

The Anglo-Brasileiro school that first brought a road here stood on the same slope, at the Chácara do Vidigal, in the 1910s. From the car you see Vidigal's houses stacked up the hillside on the inland side, and the vans that serve the bairro connect with the São Conrado metro station. Where Is São Conrado? lists the bairros around it.

The Ciclovia Tim Maia

Beside the road, along the cliff edge above the sea, runs the Ciclovia Tim Maia, a cycle path named after the singer Tim Maia and his song Do Leme ao Pontal. It opened on 17 January 2016 with almost four kilometres between Leblon and São Conrado, and the stretch on to Barra da Tijuca followed that September. In April 2016 a heavy sea brought down a section in front of the Gruta da Imprensa, and after more damage in the storms of 2019 the whole path was closed. After more than R$ 17 million of rebuilding and reinforcement it reopened on 27 February 2025.

The city now closes it whenever waves reach 2 metres, the wind passes 65 km/h or rain tops 20 mm, and it keeps a plan of alerts, temporary closures and checks on use for days of unusual weather. On a calm day the path gives cyclists the sea view without the traffic.

If you ride or run here, use the cycle path rather than the road, and go early, before the heat. The avenue's full length is roughly an hour on foot or 20 minutes by bike, and the flat beachfronts at either end, in Leblon and along São Conrado Beach, make an easy start or finish.

Closures in bad weather

In bad weather the city closes the road as a precaution. The current rule shuts it when the wind at the Vidigal weather station passes 65 km/h, as on 8 November 2025, when gusts reached 74.8 km/h, and the city also closes it in heavy rain, as on the night of 11 February 2026. Traffic then goes through the Túnel Zuzu Angel and the Túnel Acústico Rafael Mascarenhas instead, so on a stormy day check before setting off; the getting around guide covers drivers and routes.

From the villa

Through Art de Vivre's concierge you can arrange an English-speaking driver, and Leblon and Ipanema are about 15 minutes from the villa by car. A good plan is the cliff road into Leblon on a bright morning.

If you want a photograph from the Mirante do Leblon or the Gruta da Imprensa, say so before you set off, so the driver can plan where to stop. For dinner in Leblon, the dining guide has the details.