Welcome!
From Catarina and Ricardo
Catarina, half Portuguese Swedish, born and raised in Stockholm, and Ricardo from Oporto in northern Portugal met in 2006 and live happily in Santa Catarina, a historical neighborhood in Lisbon. Their kids Manel, Francisco, Sofia, and Marta were born between 2010 and 2018. While looking for a holiday place for themselves they came across this incredibly beautiful piece of land. As the property was vast and the number of ruins to recover by far exceeded their needs, the idea of creating Monte West Coast was born.
They kept on going…
They kept on buying land and ruins connected to the initial estate leading up to the 60 hectares and 14 houses of today, always with the intention of preserving this unique and wild valley. The project has grown slowly, which has enabled Catarina and Ricardo to maintain control over all details.
And continued…
The award-winning architect, Pedro Oliveira, who is a great friend, fully subscribes to the estate’s concept and shares the same obsession for details. This resulted in Monte West Coast conquering an international architectural prize as well as being covered in several top-tier magazines and publications, such as the Monocle, Attitude, and the Guardian. The houses have been decorated entirely by the couple, and several photos hanging on the walls in the houses were taken by Ricardo.
The family has a history of creating enigmatic, famous, and distinguished bars, restaurants, and clubs as well as private homes including the one that housed Madonna in Lisbon for a couple of years, but which is now the family’s private residence again. Another one is their marvelous houses in Caraíva, Trancoso in Brasil, where they spend a part of the year. If you ask Catarina, Caraíva is nothing less than one of the most magical little villages in the world. True to their essence of believing that houses are created to be used, both the ones in Lisbon and Brazil are available for rent.
Receiving people in a place that they love is a privilege for Ricardo and Catarina, and for this, they count on the help of the wonderful Marina who together with her family has been living and working on the estate since the start of this beautiful project. After all these years they are now 3 generations living on Monte West Coast.
“Setting up Monte West Coast has been really rewarding, embracing cross-fertilization between nature, preservation, architecture, and hospitality. Developing this project slowly allowed for moving with extra criteria and at the same time it involved taking beautiful decisions which will hold, hopefully, for the next generation..”
Ricardo
