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Rafael Birmann lost US$ 300 million in a crisis, saw a hotel he envisioned stall for over a decade, and rebuilt everything with the B32, the Faria Lima tower that has a theater, public square, and a 20-meter metal whale
The name behind the Whale, the largest landmark of Faria Lima Avenue in São Paulo, is businessman Rafael Birmann, and the story of how the B32 site was assembled sounds like a movie script: to gather the 14,000 square meters, he had to buy 35 houses since the late 1990s, each for a different price or exchange, totaling about R$ 56 million at the time, according to Exame, in an exclusive conversation with the businessman.
“For those who wanted a Disney trip in exchange, we gave a Disney trip. There were people who wanted a truck, we gave the truck. Some wanted an apartment in Pinheiros… There was everything,” says the president of Birmann S.A. in the interview. In the end, each square meter cost an average of R$ 4,000, but there were owners who got up to ten times more than the initial offer.
More than 20 years between the first house and the building delivery
Patience was the most used building material. The space began to be incorporated in 1998, all the houses were only purchased in 2007, and the building was delivered only in 2020, with a pause in construction from 2005 to 2007 due to complications with licenses from the São Paulo City Hall and legal processes, according to Exame.
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The land belonged to her great-great-grandfather and was worth R$ 25 per square meter during the pandemic; the couple sold 250,000 m² for the nearly R$ 30 billion project that is transforming the “neighbor of Jericoacoara,” and today a house in the region goes for R$ 4.2 million.
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An important sector in Brazil is suffering from a labor shortage, requiring the qualification of 14 million workers by 2027, leading companies to invest R$ 5 million to train professionals and address the technical deficit.
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Credit also stalled the project until the partner solved the problem once and for all: “What made things easier was my partner, Ricardo Baptista, who achieved something unprecedented at the time: 100% financing of the construction by Bradesco,” states Birmann in the report. The duo divided like in a perfect marriage of convenience: Birmann came with the idea, the partner came with the credit.
What is the B32 today: R$ 2.5 billion with theater and whale on the sidewalk
The result changed the face of the avenue. The complex houses a 24-story corporate tower, a public square with a 20-meter metallic whale sculpture, a theater for 500 people, and restaurants, with rent per square meter at about R$ 350, according to Exame. Ricardo Baptista, president of the shopping mall manager Partage, owns 50.5% of the building, and Birmann retained 39.9% after selling 13.6% to BGR Asset for R$ 340 million in November last year, which values the entire development at about R$ 2.5 billion.
The whale that gives the complex its nickname even has a celebrity technical sheet: the 20-meter-long metallic sculpture was installed in the B32 square in 2021 and cost R$ 2 million, according to Veja São Paulo. And it has already proven to be the true face of the building: when it got a Santa hat at Christmas, the poorly positioned accessory became a meme on social media and forced the B32 administration to reduce the size and reposition the hat, as reported by the same Veja São Paulo.
The crisis that cost US$ 300 million
Before the glory, came the fall. Birmann describes the turbulence of the year 2000, which cost him US$ 300 million, as a result of excessive ambition with Faria Lima, which began to emerge as a financial center in 1995, when he, a pioneer who brought the concept of triple-A corporate building to the country, started buying land everywhere, according to Exame.
“We went out buying land from all over, a little house here, another little house there,” explains the businessman, who bet that someone would come along to invest in the project. The investor did not appear, credit did not exist, and the company became immobilized, without resources. After the crisis, the lesson turned into a number: from 300 employees, the company went down to just 20.
“The biggest mistake of my life”: the hotel that slipped away out of pride
The most painful chapter involves a luxury hotel. The construction of the hotel envisioned by Birmann’s construction company in Parque Burle Marx began in 1998 and was halted in 2001, amid the crisis, disputes among partners, and lack of investors, and the project remained stalled for over a decade, according to Exame.
The detail he himself classifies as the biggest mistake of his career: a large international hotel group was willing to lend $15 million to the project, at a time when the dollar was at R$ 4, but the operation required the consent of Previ, a fund linked to Banco do Brasil, which held 49% of the business. “In the conversation with Previ, they asked me to reverse the roles. Thus, I would hold 49%, they 51%. Then I made the biggest mistake of my life: I got offended by this,” admits Birmann to Exame. “If it were today, I would agree immediately.” The project was eventually bought by an American fund in 2013, which completed the construction and opened the hotel in 2017.
The partnership that changed halfway
The B32 also changed partners during the journey. Before meeting Baptista in 2005, Birmann had closed a deal with the Zogbi Group but felt little confidence in the agreement, and in 2007, with all the houses purchased, the CEPACs arrived, the certificates of potential construction that would cost more than the land itself, at which point Zogbi decided to leave the partnership after a management disagreement and Partage entered the scene, according to Exame.
“But he entered without wanting to enter,” summarizes Birmann about the first partner, in the interview. The change of partners in the middle of a two-decade project could have buried the dream; it ended up being the turnaround that made it viable.
The final irony: the owner of the Whale in a 100-meter office
The outcome is exactly the size of the lesson. After everything, Birmann now occupies an office of only 100 square meters, within the B32 itself, and summarizes the philosophy that remained from the crises: in life and business, all that matters is the average, according to Exame. The man who once had 300 employees now runs the lean operation from inside the building that almost didn’t exist.
This newsroom’s observation, duly noted: Faria Lima is usually recounted in billions and well-tailored suits, but its most famous postcard was born from twenty years of door-to-door, trading house for Disney trip and truck, based on patience that the financial market rarely has.
From the 35 houses to the R$ 2.5 billion complex, the story of the Whale shows that the country’s tallest buildings are sometimes built on the stubbornness of just one man.
Tell us in the comments: would you trade your house for a trip to Disney, or is land in Faria Lima priceless?
