Analysis and evaluation of the extant structural and materials problems in the dome’s covering of the Metropolitan Catedral of Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil

Abstract

The Metropolitan Cathedral of Porto Alegre, in Rio Grande do Sul state, was designed by roman architect João Batista Giovenalle. This construction was developed in a long time between 1921 and 1986. The external building design has a match of granite and marble. In the body of the church was used rose granite extracted from a quarry located in Porto Alegre. Its imposing dome has covering of siliceous dolomitic marble drew out from quarry of Espírito Santo state. Originally the author of the project planned to recover this architectural element with copper, but this material was replaced by marble due to financial difficulties. However it wasn’t planned the necessary suitableness structures to perfect operation of this new material and resulted in a series of pathologies that damaged its aesthetic satisfactory design and the own building.