To help open the door to U.S. firms, the American Institute of Architects partnered with the U.S. Department of Commerce in October on an architectural trade mission to Recife and Rio. “We were essentially a matchmaking service,” says Jessica Salmoiraghi, AIA's director of federal relations and counsel. “We set up one-on-one meetings and held receptions attended by local business owners.” While the AIA is unable to confirm if any of the participants landed work in Brazil, a similar mission in 2012 led by British Prime Minister David Cameron, which included leaders from Zaha Hadid's and Norman Foster's firms, yielded substantial results. Foster has since set up a studio in São Paulo, and Hadid's office confirms it is working on a hotel in Rio.
Foreign architects have found success in Brazil before. Le Corbusier led the way in the 1930s, collaborating with Lúcio Costa and Affonso Eduardo Reidy on the pioneering Ministry of Education and Health Building in Rio. More recently, Santiago Calatrava began building the Museum of Tomorrow as part of the effort to transform Rio's waterfront. But it is not always easy going. Christian de Portzamparc's Cidade das Artes, while partly open, sits unfinished, with a lawsuit pending against the French Pritzker Prize laureate.
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