The english influence on the type morphological fabrics of Nova Lima town

Abstract

This work presents study underdone in a colonial town settled in Minas Gerais state, Brazil. This town named Nova Lima presents in its urban form a mosaic of urban experiences resulted from several urban tendencies brought to it by foreign companies to exploit gold. When gold was rare on the ground floor the Imperial brazilian court put forward a policy to bring foreign companies to exploit gold underneath earth. Several companies arrived in Minas Gerais to exploit gold, iron and diamonds from 1822 to 1889, mainly english. They brought technology, skilled workers and in order to settle them those companies implemented all facilities such as typical english victorian industrial towns, added to the former colonial core of that town. It can be said that those companies tested victorian principles in hinterland Brazil in the XIX Century and it can be also said that they acted as laboratories for urban theories that were further developed and known as garden cities. All these models can be found in Nova Lima town and they form different from the traditional urban fabric and they are also experimenting change and transformations. This paper presents the different typo morphological patterns of this town to discuss its role as urban model that was followed by the industrial cities that were implemented in the Minas Gerais state after that.