THE ICON
A New7Wonder and Symbol of Rio
How a 1930s religious monument became a global shorthand for a whole country — and what the 2007 New7Wonders vote actually was, and what it plainly was not.
Check dates and availability ↗The 2007 vote, and what it really was
In July 2007 Christ the Redeemer was named one of the New7Wonders of the World, alongside sites such as the Great Wall and Machu Picchu. It is worth being precise about what that was: a global public poll organised by a private Swiss-based foundation, decided by many millions of votes cast online and by phone. It was a popularity campaign, not an academic or governmental designation, and it was run outside the United Nations system. That distinction matters because the result is constantly, and understandably, confused with an official heritage listing — which it is not. What the vote did capture, genuinely, was the statue's extraordinary global recognition.
Why it is not a UNESCO site
The most persistent misunderstanding is that the New7Wonders result made the statue a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It did not — the two are entirely separate things, and the New7Wonders foundation is unaffiliated with UNESCO. The statue does hold real protected status, but of a different kind: it was listed as Brazilian National Historic Heritage in 2001, and it stands within Tijuca National Park, itself a protected conservation area. If you want the accurate one-line version, it is this: an internationally beloved icon, a nationally protected monument, and the winner of a private global poll — but not, in itself, a UNESCO listing.
A country rallied behind it
The 2007 campaign became a genuine national cause in Brazil. Media, companies and public figures urged people to vote, and the drive to see the statue crowned turned into a moment of shared pride. That mobilisation is part of the statue's modern story: it was already the symbol of Rio, but the campaign cemented its status as a symbol of Brazil as a whole, something the entire country could get behind. Whatever one makes of the poll's methodology, the enthusiasm it generated was real, and it deepened the bond between the monument and the national identity it had come, over the twentieth century, to represent.
Religious monument, civic emblem
The statue was conceived as an act of faith — a figure of Christ, funded by a Catholic subscription and blessed at its inauguration — and it remains a religious monument, with a chapel dedicated to Nossa Senhora Aparecida, Brazil's patron saint, consecrated at its base in 2006. But over the decades it has also become a civic emblem that reaches well beyond the church: it is where the city marks moments of celebration and mourning, where it is lit in colours for causes and tragedies, and where, arms outstretched, it seems to gather the whole city in. That double identity, sacred and civic at once, is a large part of why it resonates so widely.
The image that stands for Rio
Few single objects stand in for a city the way this one does. The open-armed silhouette on its peak has become visual shorthand for Rio, and often for Brazil, appearing in films, news broadcasts, carnival imagery and countless establishing shots the moment a story moves to the city. It has been floodlit, filmed from every angle, and reproduced on everything from postcards to opening ceremonies. Part of the power is the pose itself: a welcoming, embracing gesture that photographs cleanly against sky from almost any distance. The statue does not just sit in Rio's skyline — for much of the world, it is Rio's skyline.
An icon, up close
All of this can make the real thing feel oddly familiar before you arrive, which is its own small trap: it is easy to treat the visit as ticking off an image you already know. It rewards slowing down. Standing at the base, the scale of the soapstone figure, the wind at 700 metres, the crowd from every country doing exactly what you are doing, and the city falling away below give the icon a physical presence no photograph carries. The statue earned its place among the New7Wonders on recognition, but what stays with most visitors is not the fame — it is the plain fact of standing beneath something that large, in a spot that dramatic.