If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (including tax) available in the next 60 days.
Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (EUR240.57), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.
Wrapped up within a storybook setting of endlessly-undulating vineyards, Torre de Palma Wine Hotel has an enchanting, fairy-tale feel – especially when glasses of home-grown wine appear as if by magic at sunset, served in the highest room of the tallest tower. Said tower is in fact from the Middle Ages (dating back to 1338), which gives this restored farmstead its name. There are plenty of idyllic ways to write your Alentejo chapter, whether you’d like to lend a hand with the wine harvest, prance about the hills on a Lusitano (one of Portugal’s oldest horse breeds, and most noble steeds), or simply stargaze the night away – there’s a happily ever after here for every countrified character.
Smith Extra
Get this when you book through us:
A welcome basket with a bottle of wine, loaf of artisanal bread, cheese, jam, and walnuts from the region
Noon, but flexible, subject to availability. Earliest check-in, 3pm.
Prices
Double rooms from £219.02 (€255), including tax at 6 per cent.
More details
Rates include an Alentejo breakfast spread of locally sourced products (rustic cheese and charcuterie boards, home-baked pastries, natural fruit juices, and organic savouries), in addition to a free tour of the hotel’s winery.
Also
Most of the accommodation is on the ground floor, and there’s one specially-adapted room for guests with mobility issues.
At the hotel
Seven-hectare vineyard, artisan winery, barrel room, wine-tasting cellar, organic garden, woodland, orchards, olive grove, stables (plus equestrian equipment for hire), horse-riding arena, bikes to borrow (with local cycling maps), historic chapel, boutique, charged laundry service, and free WiFi. In rooms: air-conditioning, underfloor heating, minibar stocked with organic treats and homegrown wine, coffee machine, tea-making kit, smart TV, sound-system, and Benamôr 1925 bath products.
Our favourite rooms
Most of the rustic, shabby-chic rooms are scattered across the estate’s former stables and farmer’s cottages, but the Master Suite takes up more refined residence in the main house with its own private pool. If you’re staying during the winter, we’d opt for one of the Junior Suites with a wood-burning fireplace (and plenty of cosy nooks to curl up in with a glass of wine).
Poolside
You’ll be presented with cloud-like slippers to softly saunter around the heated indoor pool (open daily between 8.30am and 9.30pm) which is a welcome, warming haven during winter months and on chillier evenings beneath beautifully beamed ceilings. And in the summer, cooling dips in the unheated 24-hour outdoor pool provide refreshing respite from Alentejo’s desert-rivalling temperatures – the deck is fringed by vines and fragrant trees for some extra shade.
Spa
Thanks to the owners’ pharmaceutical background (and the bucolic setting which inspires the botanical wellness menu), the contemporary spa combines science-backed techniques with nature’s healing powers. Soothing treatments are delivered by Parisian brand Darphin (between 10am and 7pm), including a grape-seed and honey exfoliation which will give you a radiant Alentejo glow. There’s also a steam room, Turkish bath, sauna, and Jacuzzi to unwind in, plus personal trainers and yoga instructors available on request.
Packing tips
Experienced equestrians and first-time riders alike will want to spend some time in the saddle here. You’ll be fully kitted-out at the stables, so just bring an unbridled sense of adventure.
Also
You’ll be sleeping beneath some of the clearest skies in Europe, so it’s worth staying up to stargaze – you can even spot the Milky Way from your room most nights.
Pet‐friendly
Small, well-behaved dogs are welcome to stay in the Junior Suite, for an additional charge of €30 (a night, each pet). See more pet-friendly hotels in Alentejo.
Children
Little ones have free rein to roam and horse-ride here, with stable show-rounds and beginner-friendly lessons to keep them in the saddle (away from wine-guzzling grown-ups).
Sustainability efforts
As one of the first hotels in Portugal to achieve Biosphere certification (backed up by its B-Corp eco-credentials), Torre de Palma Wine Hotel is run from its vineyard roots with an agriculturally minded, as-nature-intended approach. Photovoltaic panels produce clean, renewable energy, and the water throughout the property is entirely heated by solar panels. The impressive drip-by-drop irrigation system efficiently waters the vineyards and sustainably-planted grounds, alongside a number of water-saving measures to help combat the arid, Alentejo summers. Everything here is kept hyper-local to support the surrounding rural communities, including the staff (entirely hired from the local area) and the hotel’s network of artisan suppliers, from cheese-makers to olive-oil producers. And if you’re not planning to explore on horseback, there are two Tesla charging stations for e-vehicles on-property to encourage greener get-arounds.
The one nearest the bottle-packed wine rack (so you can personally pick out your preferred label).
Dress Code
Down on the farm, but a touch more debonair.
Hotel restaurant
Drawing on a network of local farmers and artisan suppliers (not to mention his Michelin-starred experience), Chef Miguel Laffan is putting the plains of the Alto Alentejo region on a plate at Palma Restaurant. Tuck into deliciously wholesome dishes like wood-oven-roasted duck with a side of zingy orange and watercress salad, line-caught Portuguese squid, and locally raised beef tenderloin – all paired with organic wines from the estate.
Hotel bar
In keeping with the rest of the property’s rustic-chic aesthetic, Cortejo de Baco (open daily between 3pm and 11pm) seats mostly wine drinkers and the occasional cocktail-sinker beneath whitewashed, wooden-beamed ceilings and oversized rattan pendant lights. Graze on tapas-style snacks (like honey-drizzled, nut-topped, baked soft cheese, and mustard-slathered veal-loin sandwiches on brioche bread) between swigs of Torre de Palma wine (produced in small, vine-to-bottle batches on the estate).
Last orders
Breakfast is from 8.30am to 11.30am, lunch from 12.30pm to 3pm, and dinner from 7.30pm to 10pm.
Room service
Round-the-clock room service means organic options are always readily available.
Deep in the Alentejo lowlands, Torre de Palma Wine Hotel is a farmland fantasy gone wild. A patchwork of horse-grazed pastures, vineyards, and olive groves stretches towards the citrus-scented village of Monforte (a 10-minute drive away).
Planes
The closest airport is Lisbon, which is just a 90-minute drive from the hotel. The team is happy to help with transfers, just keep them posted on your flight times.
Trains
If you’re coming from Lisbon, there’s an hourly train to Assumar (the journey is just over 90 minutes, and the station is a further 20 minutes by car from the hotel).
Automobiles
Our preferred horsepower here is the hotel’s herd of Lusitano horses, but a set of wheels will also come in handy for navigating the more remote stretches of countryside. There’s free (covered) outdoor parking at the hotel, plus two on-site charging stations if you’re bringing an electric car.
Worth getting out of bed for
With its rambling, rural surroundings, Torre de Palma Wine Hotel is made for back-to-nature breaks – with plenty of on-estate experiences to enjoy. Saddle up one of the hotel’s majestic Lusitano horses, and take to the Tuscan-esque hills on horse-back – or ask the on-site stables about their dressage lessons to perfect your poise in the arena. Soar over the Alentejo plains on a hot-air balloon ride, then turn to the skies at night for some dazzlingly clear stargazing. Wine lovers can raise a glass to the hotel’s seven grape varieties grown over seven hectares of vineyards, where you can get hands-on (or go feet-first, if you’re more of a stomper) with the production process, particularly around the wine harvest in autumn. Daily wine tastings, vineyard tours, and a slew of other grape-based activities are on offer in the boutique wine house – where you can sample, swirl, and sip to your heart’s content in the traditional cellar and barrel room. You’ll also be sleeping a stone’s throw from the ruins of a Roman villa (thought to be the largest site of its kind in Iberia), and the Unesco-listed cities of Évora and Elvas are within easy driving distance to delve deeper into the region’s rich history.
Local restaurants
Farm-to-fork dining in Portugal’s fertile Alentejo region is just about as fresh as it comes. Restaurants around here are really quite rustic (usually family-run farmsteads serving up home-cooked suppers of sheep’s cheese, salt cod, and traditional black pork). It’s well worth making the hour’s drive to Smith stablemate São Lourenço do Barrocal for an authentic taste of Alentejo (which also happens to be the name of the estate’s organic-led, kitchen-garden-fed restaurant). Chefs follow scribbled-down family recipes here, which let the home-grown ingredients shine in all their seasonal simplicity – from freshly picked wild asparagus to estate-shot partridge.
Every hotel featured is visited personally by members of our team, given the Smith seal of approval, and then anonymously reviewed. As soon as our reviewers have returned from this working wine estate in Alentejo and unpacked their leather saddlebags and cork ‘cochos’ (traditional drinking vessels), a full account of their all-natural bountiful break will be with you. In the meantime, to whet your wanderlust, here's a quick peek inside Torre de Palma Wine Hotel in Portugal…
The once-crumbling agricultural outhouses which now make up Torre de Palma Wine Hotel were revived from ruins by the Rebelo family, who called upon Portuguese designer, Rosarinho Gabriel, to infuse the interiors with a contemporary edge – without losing the former farmhouse’s rustic charm. The result? Whitewashed walls (with the exception of a single, striking, sunshine-yellow strip) now house an artful assortment of vintage wooden furniture, equestrian-inspired knick-knacks, bohemian baskets brimming with estate-grown produce, and locally-woven textiles in a suitably down-to-earth palette.
As soul-soothing as Torre de Palma is on the inside, this rural idyll is all about living and breathing (we should also say drinking in) the Alentejo landscape. There’s an artisan winery amongst the vines, with a traditional cellar, marble presses, and a barrel room for tastings – but beyond the bottle, there’s also horse-riding, hillside picnics, and nature-inspired spa treatments to blend into your precious, slow-paced time here.
