It has two doors and three pillars: “the location, the architecture and the service”. Who puts things this way is Luisa Moura, the owner. In July 2017 this townhouse in Foz do Porto opened, an area “with a huge potential and much quieter than Baixa”, where the idea has always been to add “the very familiar atmosphere of a house” to the comfort of a hotel where there is daily cleaning, breakfast and other services such as requesting a transfer.
There are eight rooms spread over three floors, four of them facing the Douro, plus a lounge open to the inner courtyard. There are no places forbidden to guests, who sometimes even lift the dirty dishes from breakfast and take them to the canopy, as if they really were at home (some even walk barefoot).
The building was built between the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, and was all restored by Luisa’s mother – who is an architect and also designed the furniture – with construction materials and techniques “very similar to those used in the houses of Porto of this height”, from hydraulic mosaic to stone masonry system.
Instead of closets, the rooms have an open structure to hang clothes and all the rest of the décor is minimal, which perhaps explains the preference of Nordic tourists. This or the homemade cake made daily and placed in one of the living rooms, next to the coffee and cream pastries.