Oca Pavillon
Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil 2026Set within the historic gardens of the former Izabela Hendrix College, now integrated into the PUC Minas campus at the heart of the Praça da Liberdade Cultural Circuit, the Oca Pavilion proposes an encounter between memory, technology, and landscape. Conceived for CASACOR Minas 2026, the project was designed to remain as a legacy for the university and the city, providing a permanent space for gathering, learning, and cultural activities.
The concept stems from a reinterpretation of the Brazilian Indigenous oca as an archetype of shelter, gathering, and collective construction. Rather than reproducing a traditional form, the project recovers its spatial essence: an open, welcoming structure integrated with nature, capable of encouraging interaction and the shared occupation of space.
The proposal brings together technologies separated by centuries of history. Its base is composed of benches, planters, and anchoring elements produced through 3D-printed concrete, developed in partnership with Cosmos 3D. Rising above this infrastructure is a large vault constructed through the repetition of ArcelorMittal steel reinforcement bars, a material normally concealed within reinforced concrete which, in this project, takes on architectural protagonism.
This operation carries a strong symbolic dimension. The reinforcement bars cease to function as invisible reinforcement and become the architecture itself. The curved metal framework reveals the structural logic of the construction, creating a light, permeable, and transparent surface, capable of filtering light, generating shade, and defining a gathering space without the need for conventional enclosures.
The geometry of the structure simultaneously evokes Indigenous basketry, organic forms found in nature, and the large domes and vaults of modern Brazilian architecture. In a way, the project makes visible what remained concealed within Oscar Niemeyer’s concrete structures: the reinforcement that gives rise to the form. The structure becomes an architectural expression in itself.
Measuring 20 meters in length, 8 meters in width, and 4 meters in height, the pavilion creates an open and flexible space designed to accommodate outdoor classes, lectures, academic gatherings, cultural events, outreach activities, and everyday moments of social interaction. The 3D-printed concrete elements simultaneously function as structural infrastructure, furniture, and landscaping, expanding the possibilities for the use of the campus gardens.
Over time, vegetation is expected to progressively occupy the steel framework, transforming the structure into a large pergola integrated into the historic landscape of the campus. Between the ancestral oca and digital fabrication, between invisible reinforcement and exposed structure, the Oca Pavilion proposes an essential architecture, capable of bringing together technological innovation, cultural memory, and collective life in a single spatial gesture.
Project: ArcelorMittal + BCMF Arquitetos
Location: Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil
Year: 2026
Authors: Bruno Campos, Marcelo Fontes and Silvio Todeschi
Team: Anastasiia Lukashchuk, Júlia Andrade, Pedro Leão, Raquel Duarte and Cynthia Silva
Collaboration: Cynthia Silva
Construction: KATZ
Concrete: Minas Construir
Furniture: Cosmos 3D
Lighting Design: Atiâia
Lighting Fixtures: Interlight
Electrical: KEP
Decking: Madeiraria
Construction: Empreiteira Rodrigues
Landscape Design: Flavia D’Urso
