Pena National Palace
Brightly painted Romanticist palace on a Sintra hilltop, set in an 85-hectare landscaped park.
Pena stands on one of the highest points of the Sintra hills, on the site of a Hieronymite monastery wrecked by the 1755 earthquake. Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, husband of Queen Maria II, bought the ruin in 1838 and turned it into a summer residence. Building ran from 1842 to 1854 under the German mining engineer and amateur architect Wilhelm Ludwig von Eschwege, working closely with the king. The palace is regarded as the outstanding Portuguese expression of nineteenth-century Romanticism.
The design mixes neo-Gothic, neo-Manueline, neo-Islamic and neo-Renaissance elements, with ochre, red and tiled surfaces, battlements, domes and a monumental Triton gateway. The old monastery cloister and chapel survive within the complex. Around it Ferdinand laid out a park of some 85 hectares planted with species from across the world, threaded with winding paths, lakes and follies including the Chalet of the Countess of Edla. The site forms part of the Cultural Landscape of Sintra, on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1995.
Highlights
- Ochre and red Romanticist palace above the Sintra hills
- Triton gateway and preserved Hieronymite cloister and chapel
- 85-hectare park with exotic planting, lakes and follies
- Part of the UNESCO Cultural Landscape of Sintra
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