Ouro Preto

Gold was found in the streams below the peak of Itacolomi in the 1690s, and prospectors from São Paulo, Portuguese settlers and, above all, enslaved Africans poured into the mountains. The mining camps of Ouro Podre, Antônio Dias, Pilar and others were joined in 1711 as the town of Vila Rica, and in 1720 it became the capital of the new captaincy of Minas Gerais. The name Ouro Preto, "black gold", came from the gold found here coated in dark iron oxide.

In the 18th century Vila Rica was one of the largest towns in the Americas, with about 80,000 people by 1750. Officially some 800 tonnes of gold were sent to Portugal, and much more was smuggled or spent on churches. The wealth paid for a local baroque — the barroco mineiro — of the sculptor and architect Aleijadinho, the painter Manuel da Costa Ataíde and the composer Lobo de Mesquita. As the gold ran out, discontent grew, and in 1789 the town was the centre of the Inconfidência Mineira, a plot for independence whose best-known member, Tiradentes, was hanged.

The town became a city under the name Ouro Preto in 1823, and the School of Mines opened in 1876. In 1897 the state capital moved to the new city of Belo Horizonte, and Ouro Preto lost a large part of its population; the decline that followed left its colonial centre largely untouched. In 1980 it became the first place in Brazil inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Ouro Preto is the showcase of the barroco mineiro. Its churches stand on the hilltops like markers, and many were built by brotherhoods: São Francisco by a lay Third Order, while the Rosário church was founded by the brotherhood of Black men. Aleijadinho's soapstone and cedar carving is everywhere, and the town's devotion is still visible in its Holy Week, when streets are decorated with flowers for the processions.

It is also a university town. The Federal University of Ouro Preto, created in 1969 from the School of Mines and the School of Pharmacy, has about 10,000 students in the town, and many live in repúblicas — shared student houses, 66 owned by the university and some 250 private — following a tradition brought from Coimbra in Portugal. Each has its own history, names and rituals for newcomers, and their parties shape the town's nights and Carnival.

Carnival in Ouro Preto is played in the streets by blocos with brass bands; the Zé Pereira dos Lacaios, founded in 1867, is one of the oldest still parading in Brazil. The yearly winter festival, shared with Mariana, adds concerts, theatre and workshops. Soapstone carving and jewellery made from local stones, including imperial topaz, are the town's crafts.

The municipality had an estimated 78,000 people in 2025, spread across the town and a dozen rural districts. About half of residents described themselves as pardo, of mixed race, at the 2022 census, and nearly a fifth as Black, a reflection of the town's colonial history.

Tourism is one pillar of the economy, but mining and metallurgy are the other: iron ore, bauxite and other minerals are extracted around the municipality, and an aluminium plant and large mining companies are major employers. The university is a third, bringing thousands of young people from across Brazil and keeping the town busy in term time.

Life in the historic centre is shaped by the rules that protect it — new building must match the colonial style — and by the hills, which make every errand a climb. Many residents live in newer neighbourhoods outside the protected core and travel in by bus. Living alongside mining dams is a live issue in the region, which remembers the Mariana dam collapse of 2015.

Ouro Preto eats comida mineira, the farmhouse cooking of Minas Gerais. Lunch is the main meal, often at a self-service buffet where diners pay by weight: rice and beans, feijão tropeiro (beans tossed with cassava flour, bacon, sausage and egg), tutu (a thick purée of beans), couve (finely shredded collard greens) and pork in many forms, from crackling torresmo to slow-roasted cuts. Frango com quiabo, chicken with okra, is a classic of the region, and angu, a soft cornmeal, is a common side dish.

Pão de queijo, the small cheese breads of Minas made with cassava starch, are eaten at breakfast and with coffee through the day. Cheese is a source of pride, from fresh queijo Minas to aged artisanal cheeses, and is often paired with goiabada, guava paste — a combination called "Romeu e Julieta". Doce de leite and fruit preserves fill the sweet shops.

Most restaurants are in colonial houses around Praça Tiradentes and in the streets of Pilar, and the wood-fired stove, the fogão a lenha, is part of the tradition of comida mineira. In the evenings the student bars around the centre are cheap and busy, and cachaça from the stills of Minas is the local spirit.