In the heart of Moinhos de Vento, a flowery and well kept garden draws attention from curious observers who pass by 24 de Outubro Street. It is the Moinhos de Vento water treatment station square, known as Dmae Square, which supplies lots of districts in town. It integrates a complex of buildings inaugurated in 1928. There works an administrative headquarter of the municipal organ, with an art gallery.
Inspired on the Palace of Versailles, in France, the square invites us to a long stroll. The grass is always clipped and the bushes trimmed in geometrical shapes. Lots of people cross the main gate to contemplate the landscape that acts as scenario to filmings and photo essays.
Other than the natural beauty found in this place, a series of four statues in an artificial lake with fountain draws attention from whom ever walks through its lanes. What mystery is there behind those sculptures? The city council says they are historical. Monuments older than the city itself, the pieces sculpted in Fountain on Praça da Matriz, Centro.
Around 1910, the fountain was dismantled for giving place to the monument in honour of Júlio de Castilhos. Since 1936 they were on Praça São Sebastião, side by side with Rosário High School. In 2014, the statues that represented Guaíba and its affluents were transplanted to Dmae Square.
They are two feminine figures that symbolize Caí and Sinos rivers, popularly known as Nymphs, and two masculine ones which represent Jacuí and Gravataí rivers., also called Neptunes. The original conjunct included a fifth statue that symbolized Guaíba river in the figure of a boy but this one went missing.
Dmae Square opens from Monday to Sunday, from 8h to 19h. The entrance both of motorcycles or animals are not allowed.
