Project: Pantanal Biopark
Architecture: ohtake
Photo:Nelson Kon, Pablo Clemens
Geo: Campo Grande, Brazil
In the weekly projects section, you picked Pantanal Biopark by the ohtake studio. It is a 26,000 m² scientific center with a zinc facade and five million liters of water inside. Its main purpose is to tell the story of the Pantanal, the giant wetland system on the border of Brazil, Bolivia, and Paraguay. The complex itself is located in Campo Grande, hundreds of kilometers away from the wetland.
The official name of the complex is CEPRIC (Centro de Pesquisa e Reabilitação da Ictiofauna Pantaneira), though it is commonly known as Aquário do Pantanal or Bioparque Pantanal. The building stands in Parque das Nações Indígenas, one of Brazil’s largest urban parks. The site is flat, with no wetlands or even seasonal flooding: the architect’s task was to recreate an ecosystem that cannot be brought into the city — only its image, program, and scientific infrastructure.
The project took about fifteen years to complete: construction began in May 2011 and continued with interruptions — three changes of governors, investigations into overspending, the pandemic, and thirteen bidding rounds at the final stage. The author, Rui Ohtake, one of Brazil’s best-known architects of Japanese descent, did not live to see it opened. The biopark became one of his last works.
"More important than the architect is realized architecture," said Rodrigo Ohtake, the master’s son, at the opening ceremony, quoting his father.
The building has an elongated elliptical form. In Ohtake’s concept, CEPRIC mirrors the logic of the Pantanal ecosystem: water and vegetation are interwoven. There are 32 aquariums under the roof; in the open center, there are nine lagoons for caimans and giant otters. The red metal structure in the central section and the zinc panels at the "ends" of the ellipse look unexpectedly technological for Brazil, as do the insulated glass units with solar-control treatment.
Inside the complex, there are about 5 million liters of water and more than 450 species of freshwater fauna. Brazilian media call it the country’s largest freshwater aquarium and one of the first on a "world-class aquarium" level. The biopark includes a 240-seat auditorium, a library and media center dedicated to the Pantanal, a museum of the region’s history, classrooms and laboratories, a quarantine zone for fish, and spaces for permanent and temporary exhibitions. Ohtake described the project as "a mosaic of knowledge and the aesthetics of learning": not just a display of fish, but an urban beacon of science and tourism.
In recent years, the Pantanal ecosystem has suffered record fires and a decline in seasonal flooding. Of course, a science and education center in the state capital cannot replace the reserve itself, but it makes the ecosystem visible and interesting to millions who would never make it all the way to the wetlands.
@gorkjournal · GORK
3D · Photo · Render · AI
Architecture: ohtake
Photo:Nelson Kon, Pablo Clemens
Geo: Campo Grande, Brazil
In the weekly projects section, you picked Pantanal Biopark by the ohtake studio. It is a 26,000 m² scientific center with a zinc facade and five million liters of water inside. Its main purpose is to tell the story of the Pantanal, the giant wetland system on the border of Brazil, Bolivia, and Paraguay. The complex itself is located in Campo Grande, hundreds of kilometers away from the wetland.
The official name of the complex is CEPRIC (Centro de Pesquisa e Reabilitação da Ictiofauna Pantaneira), though it is commonly known as Aquário do Pantanal or Bioparque Pantanal. The building stands in Parque das Nações Indígenas, one of Brazil’s largest urban parks. The site is flat, with no wetlands or even seasonal flooding: the architect’s task was to recreate an ecosystem that cannot be brought into the city — only its image, program, and scientific infrastructure.
The project took about fifteen years to complete: construction began in May 2011 and continued with interruptions — three changes of governors, investigations into overspending, the pandemic, and thirteen bidding rounds at the final stage. The author, Rui Ohtake, one of Brazil’s best-known architects of Japanese descent, did not live to see it opened. The biopark became one of his last works.
"More important than the architect is realized architecture," said Rodrigo Ohtake, the master’s son, at the opening ceremony, quoting his father.
The building has an elongated elliptical form. In Ohtake’s concept, CEPRIC mirrors the logic of the Pantanal ecosystem: water and vegetation are interwoven. There are 32 aquariums under the roof; in the open center, there are nine lagoons for caimans and giant otters. The red metal structure in the central section and the zinc panels at the "ends" of the ellipse look unexpectedly technological for Brazil, as do the insulated glass units with solar-control treatment.
Inside the complex, there are about 5 million liters of water and more than 450 species of freshwater fauna. Brazilian media call it the country’s largest freshwater aquarium and one of the first on a "world-class aquarium" level. The biopark includes a 240-seat auditorium, a library and media center dedicated to the Pantanal, a museum of the region’s history, classrooms and laboratories, a quarantine zone for fish, and spaces for permanent and temporary exhibitions. Ohtake described the project as "a mosaic of knowledge and the aesthetics of learning": not just a display of fish, but an urban beacon of science and tourism.
In recent years, the Pantanal ecosystem has suffered record fires and a decline in seasonal flooding. Of course, a science and education center in the state capital cannot replace the reserve itself, but it makes the ecosystem visible and interesting to millions who would never make it all the way to the wetlands.
@gorkjournal · GORK
3D · Photo · Render · AI