Ipanema Hippie Fair: Art and Craft Since 1968

Every Sunday, Praça General Osório in Ipanema turns into an open-air art gallery — the Hippie Fair has gathered artisans and artists since 1968 and is now a protected piece of the city’s intangible heritage. From the Argos studios on Barata Ribeiro, it is a half-hour walk along the boardwalk into Ipanema, no car required.

Where it happens and what time

The fair fills the entire Praça General Osório, at the corner of Rua Visconde de Pirajá and Avenida Henrique Dumont, in the heart of Ipanema — the General Osório metro station sits literally inside the square, its exit facing the stalls. It runs Sundays only, from 9am to 6pm according to Riotur, the city’s official tourism board; many stalls are still setting up at 9am, so the fair reaches full swing around 10am and holds until late afternoon. Unlike the Copacabana Night Market, open daily along the boardwalk, the Hippie Fair has a single day a week — which concentrates both the crowd and the neighborhood’s more traditional vendors.

Over 50 years, now intangible heritage

The fair began in 1968, when a group of visual artists who frequented the Jangadeiros bar — among them Roberto de Sousa and José Carlos Nogueira da Gama — decided to display their own work in the square after a book fair that had taken place there. There were no stalls at first: a cloth went on the ground and each artist laid pieces beside the next. The practice took hold through the 1970s, in a Rio living under military rule, where the square became one of the few spaces of free circulation for those arriving from elsewhere — backpackers, hippies, traveling artists. In 2011, municipal Law No. 5,286 designated the Ipanema Hippie Fair as intangible heritage of the city of Rio de Janeiro, the kind of recognition given to cultural practices that outlast generations without moving from their spot.

This is not staged for tourists: Praça General Osório has turned into a gallery every Sunday since 1968, with the same artists — or their heirs — selling the same work, on the same corner of Ipanema.

What to find at the stalls

The core is original art and craft, not just souvenirs: paintings of Rio’s landscape, wood sculptures, jewelry set with Brazilian stones, original swimwear, leatherwork, and a large share of silver and semi-precious pieces. More popular craft — magnets, keychains, printed t-shirts — mixes in too, mostly toward the edges of the square. More than 200 vendors hold a standing city license to occupy the same spot every Sunday, which gives the fair a natural curation: whoever survives there has work good enough to keep a clientele coming back year after year. Payment is usually cash or Pix, negotiated directly with the artisan.

3 good reasons to pair it with Ipanema

1. The fair only happens on Sundays — travelers passing through on a weekday will not find the same program on any other day.
2. Praça General Osório sits a short walk from Ipanema beach and Jardim de Alah, so a Sunday can combine beach, fair and a late lunch in one walking route.
3. The General Osório metro station sits inside the square — for those who would rather skip the 2.5km boardwalk walk, stepping off the train drops them right into the fair.

Half an hour from the studios

From the Argos Esmeralda and Argos Safira studios, on Barata Ribeiro in Copacabana’s Posto 2, Praça General Osório is about 2.5km away — roughly a 30-minute walk along the boardwalk, past Arpoador and into Ipanema, or three metro stops from Cardeal Arcoverde to General Osório, about 10 minutes including the wait. For guests traveling for work with only Sunday free, it is the kind of outing that fits into a morning without eating into the rest of the day — leave early, catch Ipanema beach on the way back, and still make it home in time for lunch.

Frequently asked questions