Away from the world, surrounded by its farmland and woods, lies the moated manor house of De Wiersse. With 38 acres of garden and 74 acres of landscape park, the house and its surroundings have been lived in, designed and managed by the family since 1678. In this historic garden a sequence of surprises awaits the visitor – avenues and pergolas, fountains and statues, meadows and formal parterres, bridges over a gently flowing stream and a serpentine tunnel of beech.

Reggia di Caserta – Caserta Royal Palace and Park were designed in the second half of the eighteenth century by the architect Luigi Vanvitelli, commissioned by Charles Bourbon, son of Philip V of Spain and Elisabetta Farnese. The 122 hectare park is divided into 2 parts. The first contains vast parterres, separated by a central avenue which leads to the Margherita fountain and gives access to several avenues bordered with copses of limes, hornbeams and holm oaks. The Castellucia is to the left of the palace, in the so-called ”old wood”, a miniature castle in which the young Ferdinand IV practised mock battles. Further north is the Great Fishpond, an artificial lake with a little island where naval battles were simulated.

In the 19th century, Sintra was one of the first cradles of the romantic architecture in Europe, attracting those who, sensitized by the landscape, dared to retouch it with a stunning architecture in an Edenic harmony. In this picturesque setting we find, at outskirts of Sintra’s historic centre, the Quinta da Regaleira, an estate that reflects the sensibility and cultural, philosophical and scientific interests of the owner, António Augusto de Carvalho Monteiro, together with the virtuosity of the Italian architect and scenographer Luigi Manini. The culture and creativity of these two personalities resulted in an eclectic revivalist architectural ensemble, focused on the Manueline, Renaissance and Classical Styles.