Serralves Museum Porto

Lest you all think I am a traditionalist, here is the Serralves Museum in Porto Portugal. The building was designed by Alvaro Siza, the Pritzker Prize winning architect. The white stucco building is incredibly elegant with a minimum of detail, just space and shape. Even the signage made from cut out plywood is thoughtfully executed.The gardens are quite lovely in a very minimalist manner. The parterre garden is from the original 1920s house on the property.

The Palace of Queluz, Portugal

Finally, I am getting back to my posts--you'll have to excuse the pictures on their side until I figure that glitch out.. Just outside of Lisbon, Portugal is the royal Palace of Queluz often called the Versailles of Portugal, it is really more of a small summer palace for those of you/us who want to be precise (just as BA is not the Paris of South America--trust me). It is incredibly pretty but sort of run down, you sort of wish there was a conservancy that would start to renovate the buildings and work on the gardens. However, as with most of the Portugal that we (that's Kendell at the edge of the fountain) saw, it is not gentrifed and that is a big plus.