Architects often enjoy viewing projects through floor plans, and some landscape architecture works are so large that they’re hard to appreciate without this view fully. Seeing them from above lets you understand their full essence and admire the entire design. We’ve selected a series of aerial photographs of Roberto Burle Marx’s works, provided by the Spanish company Deimos Imaging, offering a rare perspective you may not have seen before.
Although mostly self-taught, Burle Marx is regarded as the father of Brazilian landscape architecture. He elevated the profession by integrating landscape architecture with architectural and urban development projects. His legacy includes not only earning international acclaim for modern Brazilian landscape design but also introducing native plant species into projects of all sizes, both in Brazil and globally, resulting in distinctive and innovative compositions. In addition to his landscape work, he explored various artistic fields, including painting, drawing, sculpture, tapestry, and crafts.
The images were captured by the Deimos-2 satellite, launched in 2014 and designed to take ultra-high-resolution photos of Earth, showing the current state of some of Burle Marx's most iconic works. For a few projects, we’ve added detailed images from Google Earth. When viewed on this scale, Burle Marx’s designs reveal a new perspective, highlighting both their surroundings and the mature, well-established vegetation. These projects, spread across various cities worldwide, showcase Burle Marx’s signature creativity in plant arrangements, water features, and paving patterns.
1 - Kuala Lumpur City Centre Park
Location: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Project Date: 1993
Execution Date: 1995/1997
Landscape Area: 300,000 m²
Architecture: Cesar Pelli Architects Assoc. (Petronas Towers)
Fun Fact: It is considered Roberto Burle Marx’s last authored project.
2 - Generalísimo Francisco De Miranda Park
Location: Caracas, Venezuela
Project Date: 1950
Execution Date: 1959 - 1961
Park Area: 82 hectares
Architecture: Fernando Tábora and John Stoddart
Fun Fact: It was originally designed to host the 1960 Caracas International Exhibition, but this idea was abandoned after the fall of dictator Pérez Jiménez's government.
3 - Mangabeiras Square
Location: Belo Horizonte, MG
Project Date: 1980
Execution Date: 1991
Landscape Area: 2,274,400 m²
Fun Fact: Nestled within dense native forest, it houses 59 springs of the Córrego da Serra, which is part of the São Francisco River Basin.
4 - Ilha Pura Park – Rio 2016 Athletes’ Village
Location: Rio de Janeiro, RJ
Project Date: 2010
Execution Date: 2016
Landscape Area: 65,000 m²
Fun Fact: One of the last projects by the office, it features 7 lakes, 2 fountains—totaling 8,500 m² of water surfaces—and a 20,000 m² nursery.
5 - BNDES Headquarters and Largo da Carioca
Location: Rio de Janeiro, RJ
Project Date: 1974/1985 (Connection with Largo da Carioca)
Land Area: 18,000 m²
Landscape Area: 11,000 m²
Architecture: Alfred Willer, Ariel Steele, Joel Ramalho, Jose Sanchotene, Leonardo Oba, Rubens Sanchotene, Oscar Muller (BNDES)
Fun Fact: In this project, Burle Marx used native vegetation to recreate the contours of the hill that existed before the building's construction, seamlessly integrating it with the paving design of Largo da Carioca in a continuous project.
6 - Senador Salgado Filho Square
Location: In front of Santos Dumont Airport, Rio de Janeiro, RJ
Project Date: 1938
Execution Date: 1950
Architecture: Marcelo and Milton Roberto (Airport)
Fun Fact: This is the first public garden project by the landscape architect for the city of Rio de Janeiro.
7 - Copacabana Sidewalk
Location: Rio de Janeiro, RJ
Project Date: 1970
Execution Date: 1971
Landscape Area: 4.6 km
Fun Fact: Designed as a massive canvas, it is one of his most iconic and famous projects.
8 - Flamengo Park
Location: Aterro do Flamengo, Rio de Janeiro, RJ
Project Date: 1954/1961
Execution Date: 1962/65, renovation 1999/2000
Landscape Area: 1,200,000 m²
Architecture: Affonso Eduardo Reidy (MAM), Jorge Machado Moreira, Carlos Werneck de Carvalho (Puppet Theater), Helio Mamede
Fun Fact: With urban planning coordination by Lota de Macedo Soares, it is one of the largest and most renowned projects by the office, both in area and extension.
9 - MAM – Museum of Modern Art
Location: Aterro do Flamengo, Rio de Janeiro, RJ
Project Date: 1954/1957/1960/2006
Execution Date: 1956
Landscape Area: 99,000 m²
Architecture: Affonso Eduardo Reidy (MAM)
Fun Fact: One of the most notable features of the project is the reproduction of the Copacabana sidewalk pattern; the characteristic waves are recreated here using two different species of grasses.
10 - Edmundo Cavanelas Residence
Location: Pedro do Rio, RJ
Project Date: 1954
Landscape Area: 7,420 m²
Architecture: Oscar Niemeyer (House)
Fun Fact: It appears in the film Flores Raras (2013) alongside Oscar Niemeyer's house, which serves as the setting for Lota de Macedo Soares' residence.
11 - Burle Marx Park
Location: São Paulo, SP
Project Date: 1940s
Execution Date: 1950s, renovation 1995
Landscape Area: 4,000 m²
Fun Fact: It features a large sculptural panel with high and low reliefs that were originally part of the garden of Baby Pignatari's residence, designed by Oscar Niemeyer. Today, it stands as a significant remnant of the Atlantic Forest in São Paulo.
12 - Euclides da Cunha Square
Location: Recife, PE
Project Date: 1930s
Execution Date: 1930s, renovation 2004
Fun Fact: One of the first public gardens designed by the landscape architect, it features a wide variety of cacti to showcase the typical caatinga vegetation of Pernambuco, inspired by Euclides da Cunha's book Os Sertões.
13 - Gardens of the Public Buildings of Brasilia
Location: Brasília, DF
Project Date: Early 1960s
Fun Fact: Integrated with the surrounding architecture, these gardens primarily feature water features and tropical species from the Brazilian Cerrado and Amazon. Notable buildings include the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Palácio do Itamaraty, 1965), Ministry of Defense (Praça dos Cristais, 1970), Ministry of Justice (1970), Federal Court of Accounts (1972), Superquadra 308 Sul (1972), Vice Presidential Residence (1975), National Theater Rodrigo Santoro (1976), and Parque Pithon Farias (1976).
Contributors: Burle Marx; CARDOSO, Marianna Gomes Pimentel (2014); OLIVEIRA, Ana Rosa de (2015).
