Casa de São Lourenço - Burel Panorama Hotel

In 1948 the Pousada de São Lourenço opened at 1,250 metres in the Serra da Estrela, part of a national programme that paired modern architects with regional building traditions. The architect was Rogério de Azevedo, and his intention was plain: the building is an instrument for looking at the landscape. It leans out over the glacial valley of the Zêzere with the village of Manteigas far below.

The interiors were handed to Maria Keil, one of the most significant Portuguese designers of the twentieth century, who designed a complete set of furniture and decoration around a vernacular idea of Portuguese character. Her chestnut pieces, carved in bas-relief, and her recurring motifs of the thistle, the wolf and the star, are the reason this building matters beyond its view.

The restoration kept both. Keil's original furniture was restored and adapted rather than replaced, and her drawings became the hotel's graphic identity, appearing as projections on walls, embroidered into cushions and cut into wood. Around them the architects worked in concrete, wood and burel, the coarse local sheep's wool that has been woven in these mountains for centuries and is now made a few kilometres away. In the corridors, curtains hide the bedroom doors and small perforations let light through to mark the entrances, which is a piece of stagecraft that should be fussy and is instead rather beautiful.

There are 17 rooms and four suites, all different, from 23 to 35 square metres, with private balconies or terraces. Burel blankets on every bed, cotton percale sheets, a pillow menu, art by Portuguese makers.

The pools are the thing people photograph. An indoor pool connects to a heated outdoor pool set in a garden of native planting, with the glacial valley behind it, so you can swim from inside to out in the cold. There is a hammam and a mountain spa.

This is the only five-star hotel in the Serra da Estrela and the only mountain hotel of its kind in Portugal. The range is a UNESCO Global Geopark, with walking, cycling and, in winter, the country's only ski area. Manteigas and its hot springs are a few kilometres below.

It took a Michelin Key in 2025 and is a member of Relais & Châteaux.