Leme's black monolith — the tallest tower on the beach, famous for its New Year's Eve fireworks waterfall.
Landmark buildingThe tower at Avenida Atlântica 1020 marks the start of the Leme stretch, where Avenida Princesa Isabel meets the sea. Designed by Paulo Casé and Luiz Acioli and opened in 1975 as the Hotel Méridien, the 39-story black slab is the tallest building on the Copacabana–Leme waterfront and one of the most recognizable silhouettes on the beach.
After three decades as the Méridien, the building reopened in 2010 as the Windsor Atlântica after its purchase by the Windsor group, and since May 2017 it has operated as the Hilton Rio de Janeiro Copacabana, with 545 rooms looking out over the beach toward the Sugarloaf side.
Address: Av. Atlântica 1020, Leme, Rio de Janeiro
The Méridien opened in 1975, the French chain's statement property in Rio, and quickly became part of the city's calendar: for 21 years its facade carried the réveillon 'waterfall' — a cascade of fireworks poured down the full height of the tower at midnight on New Year's Eve. The tradition ended after an accident at the 2001 celebration, when the fire department stopped authorizing pyrotechnics on building terraces.
Ownership has changed hands several times since — Previ in the 1990s, Windsor in 2009, Blackstone with Hilton management in 2017, and the HSI fund in 2024 — but to many cariocas the building is still simply 'o Méridien'.
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Browse all properties →Where Clarice Lispector wrote her final novels
Leme's original beachfront grand hotel, open on Avenida Atlântica since 1964.
Copacabana's most storied address, beside the Copacabana Palace
Where Tom Jobim composed the soundtrack of bossa nova
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