The Fonte da Pipa palace
The Fonte da Pipa palace

The Fonte da Pipa palace

The Fonte da Pipa palace

Ode to northern Europe palaces

Loulé, Portugal

Known for its carnival and market of great beauty, Loulé is a city of 70,000 inhabitants located in the south of Portugal, in the Algarve region.

It is built between 1878 and 1897 the small castle of Pipa palace which will never be occupied by its owner. Death a year before the end of the works, the politician and the businessman Marçal de Azevedo Pacheco will never live in this palace. Yet the man had to make this place a true ode to beauty. Inspired by many palaces he had visited during numerous trips to Northern Europe, he had mandated the architect José Verdugo, recognized for the Loulé Market he had designed, as well as the decorator Pereira Cao who worked at Palace in Lisbon.

Thus in 1920, the palace is sold to a rich banker called Dias Sancho, who would see the electrification of the premises. After the death of his son who receive the property at the death of his father, the small palace was subsequently sold, rented and resold until it was abandoned around the new millennium.

It is hard to find the information to explain the reasons for this abandonment and the exact year.

Despite the years that have passed, the community still shows (a little) interest in the potential of the places. In 2010, the small palace Fonte de la Pipa was part of a cultural project where African art was presented.

Since then, no formal project has come to fruition, hence the unenviable situation of the places today. Tagged and vandalized, the small palace seems to be at a non-return point if nothing is done in the next years. 

Related content

The Ogilvie widow's abandoned mansion
Laurentides, Quebec (Canada)

Built in 1923 by Helen Johnston, widow of William Watson Ogilvie, the mansion incorporates all the components required by the old bourgeoisie. It must be said that her husband William W. Ogilvie had made a fortune in the grain trade, and when he...

The antiquarian's house
Eastern townships, Quebec (Canada)

The place is surprising. This old rooming house next to an old railway was, in another era, the nerve center of this small village in Eastern Townships. Abandoned for over fifty years according to some, it remained intact and time has slowly...

The abandoned music studio
North of Montreal, Quebec (Canada)

Built by record producer Andre Perry in the early 70s, Le Studio is a real monument in the history of music. Located in the Laurentian mountains, an hour and a half north of Montreal , the site was a huge recording facility, featuring the most...

The Buzludzha monument
Buzludzha, (Bulgaria)
A historical brief

We are in Bulgaria, a small state of Central Europe who joined the European Union in 2007 and still relatively unknown outside its touristy areas of the Black Sea.

The construction of the building began in 1974 and the...