Eugenio Rayneri Piedra was the architect of numerous buildings in Havana, son of Eugenio Rayneri Sorrentino a remarkable architect, author of the entrance of the Colón Cemetery, the Palace of the Marquise of Villalba, and the Mercado de Tacón. Noteworthy, Rayneri Piedra was one of the architects of the Cuban National Capitol Building, (Capitolio Nacional), completed in 1929 during the administration of President Gerardo Machado Morales together with architects Govantes & Cabarrocas, Raul Otero and Bens Arrarte among others. Both Rayneri Piedra and his father won the International Contest for the Capitolio with their entry named "The Republic". Rayneri Piedra was Artistic and Technical Director along the construction process of the building, built by American construction company Purdy & Henderson. The first graduate of the University of Notre Dame School of Architecture (Indiana, USA) in 1904, returned to Havana to enter into private practice with his father. He won an international competition for Cuba’s Presidential Palace, and was founder and first president of the Cuban Society of Architects. He was also professor at the University of Havana, brother of pianist Laura Rayneri Piedra, and uncle of ballet master

Fernando Alonso (dancer) Fernando Alonso (17 December 1914 – 27 July 2013) was a Cuban ballet dancer. He is a co-founder of the Cuban National Ballet and was part of the American Ballet Theatre company between 1940 until 1948. Biography Born as Fernando Juan Evangel ...

.Singer, Toba (2013). ''Fernando Alonso: The Father of Cuban Ballet.'' Gainesville: University Press of Florida. .

El Capitolio

According to its architect, Eugenio Rayneri Piedra, the inspiration for the cupola came from the Panthéon in Paris by way of Bramante's Tempietto in San Pietro in Montorio. The cupola, which is stone clad around a steel frame that was constructed in the United States, is set planimetrically forward on the building to allow for the apse that contains La Republica, the "Statue of the Republic". At almost 92 m (302 ft) high, the dome was the highest point in the city of Havana until 1956 when the

FOCSA Building The FOCSA Building is a residential and commercial block in the Vedado neighborhood of Havana, Cuba. At , it is the tallest building in Cuba. It was named after the contracting company ''Fomento de Obras y Construcciones, Sociedad Anónima'', and ...

was built reaching a height of 121 meters (397 ft). The Capitolio had the third highest dome in the world at the time of its construction.

References

Gallery

File:Estación Villanueva La Habana (1850).JPG, Map of Havana, 1850. The land currently occupied by the Capitol, then belonging to the railway station of Villanueva, is framed in red. Opposite the Capitol are the city walls demolished in 1863. File:Havana Capitolio under construction.jpg, Image of the construction of the upper dome, taken c. 1928 File:Parque de la Fraternidad, El Capitolio, and El Paseo del Prado, Havana, aerial view, 1931.jpg {{DEFAULTSORT:Piedra, Eugenio Rayneri Cuban architects 1883 births 1960 deaths Architects from Havana Notre Dame School of Architecture alumni