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The Lumiares Hotel & Spa
Lisbon, Portugal · Independent · Accessible Luxury
The Palacio dos Condes de Lumiares takes up an entire Bairro Alto block, and when Bomporto found it the 1703 house was close to a ruin. What survived is the good part: a Baroque stone staircase that splits into two symmetrical flights, and a deliberately plain facade that gives away nothing from the street. Behind it are 53 apartments with kitchens and sitting rooms. The Gloria funicular stops at the door.
- 53 rooms
- Opened 2017
- Neighborhood: Bairro Alto
- Architect: Helder Cordeiro and Joao Pedro Pedras (2014-2017 conversion)
About The Lumiares Hotel & Spa
- D. Leonor de Tavora bought the crumbling house that stood here, had it pulled down, and put up the present building in 1703. The Lumiares name arrived later, through her descendant the Count of Lumiares.
- The palace was carved up into rented tenements in 1779 and lost most of its character. The Baroque staircase and a chapel facade are what came through.
- That chapel facade is still there, now standing inside a ground-floor restaurant on Travessa da Boa Hora.
- Miguel Castro e Silva, one of Portugal's best known chefs, opened the rooftop restaurant when the hotel launched in June 2017.
History
In the sixteenth century this block at the top of Bairro Alto held a farm called the Quinta dos Alteros, whose owner Joao de Altero de Andrade built an imposing house on it that stood into the seventeenth century. When it began to fail, D. Leonor de Tavora, widow of Tristao da Cunha, bought the property, ordered the old house demolished, and raised the present building in 1703 next door to the Palacio Ludovice. It was later known as the Palacio dos Condes de Lumiares after her descendant Manuel Inacio da Cunha e Menezes, Count of Lumiares. The facade is deliberately sober, in the Portuguese plain style, and gives no hint of what is inside: a monumental stone staircase in Baroque taste that splits into two symmetrical flights, lit through three storeys, with Joanine-era window surrounds and volutes on the landing. The building lost its character in 1779 when it was converted into rented tenements, and the old main entrance hall was eventually let out to shops. A chapel facade survived at ground level and now sits inside a restaurant on Travessa da Boa Hora. Bomporto Hotels, which will only take on buildings with a history, acquired it in 2014 with the palace close to ruin. Architects Helder Cordeiro and Joao Pedro Pedras handled the conversion of roughly 8,200 square metres, keeping the exterior facades. The Lumiares opened in June 2017 with 53 units, all of them genuine apartments with kitchens and living areas, from studios up to penthouses with terraces, plus a spa, a gym and underground parking, which is close to unheard of in central Lisbon. Miguel Castro e Silva opened the rooftop restaurant, Lumi, and the Mercado Cafe followed that August. Furniture was designed in Porto, bathroom amenities come from the Porto soapmaker Claus Porto, and the tilework is modern geometric Portuguese.
The setting
The hotel stands at the top of the Gloria funicular, which is the quickest way up from the Avenida da Liberdade end of the city, and beside the Miradouro de Sao Pedro de Alcantara, the terrace that looks straight across the valley at Sao Jorge castle. That puts it on the boundary of two different Lisbons. Bairro Alto below and around it is the old bohemian grid, quiet by day and loud by night, full of small fado houses, bars and street art. A few minutes downhill is Chiado, which is bookshops, theatres and the Sao Carlos opera house. Praca do Principe Real and its garden are a short walk north. The block itself is bounded by Rua de Sao Pedro de Alcantara, Travessa da Boa Hora, Travessa da Agua da Flor and Rua do Diario de Noticias, the street that gave Lisbon's newspaper trade its address.
Restaurants and bars
- Lumi Rooftop — Restaurant
Amenities
- Private kitchens in apartment-style rooms
- Early check-in and late check-out subject to availability
Open The Lumiares Hotel & Spa in the atlas for live weekend rates, photos, and the full folio.
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