Quinta da Regaleira in Sintra, Portugal

May 29th, 2010 | Tina Noga | Events and Activities, General, Travel | No Comments »

Quinta da Regaleira is a fairytale house in a fairytale landscape and well worth a visit.

The house and the garden is one of the most enigmatic monuments of the cultural landscape of Sintra. The present-day form was built between 1898 and 1912 under the supervision of Carvalho Monteiro. The style is neo-manuelin and the decorative theme involved some of Portugal’s best artists: Antonio Goncalves, Joao Machado, Jose da Fonseca, Costa Motta and Rodrigo de Castro, as sculptors in stone and Julio da Fonseca, in wood.

The garden, as an image of the Cosmos, is revealed through a succession of magic and mysterious places. You will find abundant references to the world of mythology, to Olympus, Virgil, Dante, Milton and Camoes, and to the mission of the Templars as continued by the Order of Christ, to great mystics and miraculous magicians, and to the enigmas of the alchemical Ars Magna.

The house is a magic castle with fairytale carvings of all sorts. Plan to spend at least three hours exploring the place.

Good luck.

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