Things to do in Brasília

Landmark · Eixo Monumental

Niemeyer's ministries in a line, the twin towers of Congress, and the square where the presidency, Congress and the Supreme Court face each other.

Local tip: Go at sunset when the light hits the marble and the crowds have gone. Congress runs free guided tours and the Supreme Court sessions are open to the public — this is one of the few capitals where you can simply walk in and watch the state work.

Culture · Eixo Monumental and Asa Sul

Niemeyer's crown-of-thorns cathedral entered through an underground passage, and a modernist church walled entirely in blue Murano glass.

Local tip: The cathedral is famous and the Santuário Dom Bosco is not, which is backwards. Go to Dom Bosco in the late afternoon when the sun comes through 7,400 panes of blue glass; it is the single most extraordinary interior in the city and it is free.

Nature · Between Asa Sul and the Setor de Clubes

One of the largest urban parks in the world — bigger than Central Park — with a 10 km running circuit, lakes and open cerrado.

Local tip: The park is where Brasília actually socialises. Go early in the dry season: at midday in August the humidity readings make hard exercise genuinely inadvisable, and everyone local knows to move their run to six in the morning.

Nightlife · Lago Sul, on the Paranoá shore

The lakeside bar and restaurant deck where the city drinks, with the Plano Piloto skyline across the water.

Local tip: Sunset from the Pontão or from the Ermida Dom Bosco on the far shore is the local ritual. The lake is artificial, was built to raise the humidity of the plateau, and is swimmable in places — ask which, because it varies by sector.

Food · Ceilândia, 25 km west of the Plano Piloto

A vast permanent market of north-eastern food, forró halls and herb stalls, in the administrative region that half the Federal District calls home.

Local tip: Almost no foreign resident ever leaves the Plano Piloto, which is why this is the best thing on the list. Weekend evenings the forró halls fill and the market becomes something else entirely. Take a taxi or the metro to Ceilândia and ask for the Feira do Trabalhador.

Neighborhood · Asa Sul

The prototype superblock — six-storey buildings on open pilotis, a shared park, a school in the entrequadra and Niemeyer's small chapel behind it.

Local tip: Walk it to understand the whole city. The buildings stand on columns so the ground stays public and continuous, the school and the church sit between blocks rather than inside them, and the commercial strip faces inward. It is the clearest surviving statement of what Lúcio Costa actually intended.