Alfredo, the great creator of Herdade da Matinha, had the good fortune, or chance, to be born with a few extra ribs. From painter to cook; from farmer to gardener to craftsman; from architect to decorator, he travels through time and leaves his mark.
The paintings that can be found in Matinha, when you wander carefully through the house, show in them the inspirations felt and the thoughts had in years of life. The walls on which they hang have also grown one after the other, at the behest of a man who was creating as he created.
“It makes sense when it makes sense,” I heard someone say one day. Well, if there’s one project that’s been done in time, and has expanded the space when the space asked for more space, it’s this one.
The guardian of this house does not override the rules of the house, as the men of old did. No… Just like you used to lie in your children’s beds.
When it was time to go to bed, to listen to his dreams for the next day, Alfredo was attentive to the sounds echoing from inside his house. I could feel the wood cracking, the breeze calling for more people, and with every touch of the metal plate, a soul fell and wanted to stay there.
And so the house came to life, from the life it was given on request. You never wanted too much, because you never wanted to be anything else. Everything that increased in the body came from the same essence that it already was.
All you have to do is sit down at the table, with the plates placed on the patchwork tablecloth woven by Alfredo, and you can see in detail the design that makes up this place: a project that is mixed in form and organic in soul. An open canvas that, patch by patch, has been sewing together the world that hides in this valley.
