Chamber of Deputies Premises

          The Palace of the National Congress is the seat of the Legislative branch since 1960, the year that the Federal Capital was transferred from Rio de Janeiro to Brasilia.  The National Congress project is signed by architect Oscar Niemeyer, who took into consideration the local topography, emphasized its size, its free spaces and visual depth, and gave the building a monumental character, despite the simplicity of its geometric forms. The architect highlighted the Plenary Chamber of both houses of Parliament by erecting two domes above each one of them.

          The two towers of the building count 28 floors. They are the highest buildings in town and home to the administrative units of the Legislative, as well as to the Ulysses Guimarães and Milton Campos Foundations. Niemeyer remarked, once, the convex and the concave structures as the most important features of the building. The convex form is the chamber of the Senate and the concave houses the Chamber floor.” The placement of the domes is merely for aesthetic purposes,” Niemeyer said. The Chamber floor is larger than the Senate’s because the number of Representatives is bigger than the number of Senators. In the Chamber, the architectural ensemble is composed by the Main Building and four Annexes, which makes a 145.000 m²built area.

Administrative Office Hours

          The ordinary Administrative office hours of the Chamber of Deputies lasts eight hours, Monday to Friday. It is divided in two schedules:

 I  – from 9 am to 12 am
 II – from 1:30 pm to 6:30 pm or until the end of the plenary session.

In case of extraordinary session, the administrative services remain open until the end of the session.