There is something absolutely beautiful about seeing a building being built out of the same materials that compose the landscape. Sure, marble and mahogany island kitchenettes are fun, but have you ever picked up rocks from the ground and made a wall out of it?

Tadelakt is a very good word. I heard it for the first time a couple of weeks ago and since then I’ve said it or heard it every day. And what is it after all?

At Vale das Lobas, in the area above the village of Sobral Pichorro, there is an incredible forest of tall, thin trees, with light-brown trunks covered in green, fluffy lichen, whose floor is now covered in a bed of leaves representing autumn hues. They are chestnut trees…

“So, let’s have a look inside!” Dino and I walk into the restaurant through the open door by balancing on a metal platform over a thin water channel…

“The beauty of the hydropower is of course that it’s running 24h a day, which is very different from solar.… So especially for these kitchen equipments like fridges, which need power continuously, they are ideal to be powered by the hydroturbine…