Vila Jóia

Maputo [Lourenço Marques], Maputo, Mozambique

Housing

A small palace located in the large Tunduru Garden in the heart of Maputo, it was the house of Gerard Pott, a pre-eminent personality in the city. The building from the 1890s, along classical lines, includes a central pediment and ground-level arcades and is surrounded by a long covered veranda on the first floor. It must correspond to the residential architecture that was prevalent in South Africa in the 1900s. Purchased by the State in 1914, it was a Provincial Museum in colonial time and later the Supreme Court.