Catetinho, Presidential heritage museum in Park Way, Brazil.
Catetinho is a long, single-storey wooden building in Park Way, with white horizontal-plank walls, a dark ridged roof on slender reddish-brown posts, and a white fascia along the lower roof edge. A wooden external staircase on the left leads to an upper level, while the front posts form a recessed ground-level gallery; small dark ventilation openings sit high on the white wall. It was designed by Oscar Niemeyer and built in ten days in October 1956.
President Juscelino Kubitschek established this residence as a temporary stay during Brasilia's construction. The building was completed in ten days in November 1956.
The guitarist Dilermando Reis coined the name Catetinho as a diminutive of the Palácio do Catete in Rio de Janeiro, then the federal government's residence. The building was first called Palácio das Tábuas, or Palace of Planks. Its collection holds Reis's guitar and personal objects of Juscelino Kubitschek, such as books and clothes.
The museum sits on the BR-040 highway and opens Tuesday through Sunday from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM. Guided tours help visitors understand the site's history and spaces more fully.
The song "Água de Beber" began at the spring beside the Catetinho: Tom Jobim and Vinicius de Moraes were invited by Juscelino Kubitschek to write an anthem for the new capital, and the verse "É água de beber, camará" came from that water. The spring has no name honouring Jobim; the museum keeps Dilermando Reis's guitar.
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