Monte Ferrenho - Farm
Alentejo | Portugal
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Monte Ferrenho Farm
Starting from a Blank Canvas by Rawness
Nestled in Alentejo’s rolling hills, just 25 minutes from stunning beaches like Vila Nova de Milfontes, Malhão, and Aivados, Monte Ferrenho spans 11.6 hectares of ancient cork oaks, olive trees, fruit trees, and expansive views.
Rawness is transforming this estate into a luxury regenerative retreat for 10 guests, restoring soil, biodiversity, and local communities through regenerative agriculture, hospitality, and education.
With five wells for water security and Santiago do Cacém municipality approval for a 344.21 m² farmhouse with five en-suite bedrooms and 129 m² agricultural buildings (total 473.21 m²), this project embodies the heart of a Rawness regenerative sanctuary.
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Pioneering Regeneration from the Ground Up
From a blank canvas of 11,6 hectares, we’re building a place where biophilic design, seasonal edible gardens, soil health and community programs come together.
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Phase 1 Monte Ferrenho Stay: 344.21 m² luxury farmhouse, 10 guests, five spacious en-suite bedrooms, generous indoor-outdoor living, and a working edible garden for our guests.
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Phase 2 Monte Ferrenho Farm: 129 m² agricultural multi-purpose space for Taste the Farm events, workshops and retreats. With five wells for resilience and pre-approval, Monte Ferrenho is a model site for regenerative hospitality in Alentejo.
Our Story
Born from the regenerative movement, Monte Ferrenho brings land restoration, food forests and community back into one experience. We revive soil and biodiversity, and create abundance with local partners and makers, so guests feel, taste and learn what regenerative living means.
Restoring the Land — A Biodiverse Regenerative Farm in the Making
We surround the farmhouse with diverse edible gardens to supply seasonal produce year-round. Fresh harvests support guests, neighbors and nearby restaurants. Over time, we plant a mosaic of fruit trees and native species to build a resilient, polycultural system that enriches soil and ecosystems.
Radical Diversity in Action — A Multifaceted Regenerative Experience
The farmhouse welcomes families and groups for regenerative stays; the agricultural building becomes a community hub for farm-to-table events and workshops covering regenerative agriculture, permaculture and wellness.
A Space for Connection and Growth
We cultivate a culture of reciprocity and resilience. Through food, learning and partnership programs, guests reconnect with land and community and help regenerate both.
Monte Ferrenho Farm
Re-rooting Food, Community, and Meaning
At Rawness, an important part of regeneration is the simple act of growing food where life itself unfolds — within a landscape abundant in biodiverse ways of cultivating our life essentials.
When nourishment returns to the places we inhabit, something fundamental shifts — not only in ecology, but in economy and culture.
Over time, humanity placed its most essential relationship — with food, soil, and nature — far outside daily life. This distance didn’t just remove us from nature; it created the foundation of an extractive system.
The further we outsource our basic needs, the more we construct industries that must extract resources, labour, and value to sustain themselves.
Regeneration, then, is not a call to self-sufficiency — it’s a call to re-balance how we outsource. It’s about creating reciprocal systems where what we delegate to others still nourishes life around us, instead of depleting it.
That is the role of the Agricultural Building & Community Hub at Monte Ferrenho
It is both a working agricultural space and a living classroom — a place where guests can experience the full cycle of regeneration. Here, food grows where people gather; hands in the soil meet minds in conversation. Workshops, farm-to-table dinners, and daily harvesting reconnect guests with the rhythm of a regenerative life.
‘’You don’t have to be the farmer — but you can once again be near the farm’’
The gardens, orchards, and soil become shared ground — maintained by local stewards, nourished by guests, and celebrated through community. Every tomato picked, every seed planted, every meal shared becomes an act of healing — of the land, the economy, and ourselves.
The Spectrum of Regenerative Living
Monte Ferrenho Farm
Each Rawness stay embodies the full spectrum of regenerative lifestyle design — from farm to farmstead to homestead. Guests can explore which rhythm resonates most deeply, and perhaps take inspiration home to live their own version of regeneration.
Regenerative Farm
‘’A working landscape devoted to production and restoration.’’
It reveals how food systems can heal ecosystems — growing abundance without depletion. At Rawness, our farms showcase regenerative agriculture in practice: soil building, composting, agroforestry, and biodiversity as economy.
Farmstead
‘’The bridge between living and producing’’
Here, food is grown not only for sale, but also to nourish those who live and stay on the land. It’s where guests experience abundance — farm-to-table dining, community markets, and shared harvests.
Homestead
‘’The most personal layer of regeneration — where the landscape around the home becomes alive again.’’
A Rawness homestead is not about doing everything yourself, but about bringing food production back home. Tasks can still be outsourced — yet the gardens, orchards, and soil remain right where you live. You benefit directly from fresh, seasonal food, a biodiverse landscape, and the joy of seeing life flourish around you.
At Monte Ferrenho, this begins right from Phase 1, where the edible gardens surrounding the stay are established together with the farmhouse. Guests can immediately enjoy an abundance of fresh ingredients grown on-site — the first expression of regeneration in daily life.
The expansion of Monte Ferrenho Farm in Phase 2 will deepen this foundation, evolving from self-sufficiency to a second income stream through workshops, community markets, and regenerative produce — extending the circle of abundance from guests to the wider region.
‘’Those who tend the land work in beauty and variety, not in industrial monocultures.’’
An invitation to awareness
It’s strange that we’ve accepted buying all our food from distant shops as normal, while every product there was also grown or made by someone else — just far away.
Rawness reverses that logic: instead of travelling to find what we need, we let it grow around us. Whether you walk through a supermarket or step into your own garden, both involve human effort — but only one brings you back into daily contact with nature.
Together, these layers form the foundation of Rawness: a living system that transforms extraction into regeneration, production into participation, and travel into a journey back to balance.
Farm-to-Table Events, Daily Community Markets & Workshops
‘’At Monte Ferrenho, regeneration doesn’t end with our guests — it begins with them.’’
Beyond offering immersive stays that embody the principles of regenerative living, we open our doors to the wider community.
Through farm-to-table events, farm tours, daily community markets, and hands-on workshops, we create spaces where locals, travellers, and artisans meet around food, craft, and culture.
Our regenerative farm supplies farm boxes filled with fresh, seasonal produce to nearby residents and restaurants, cultivating a local food network that keeps value and nourishment within the region.
This not only allows guests to experience a living, working regenerative farm, but also strengthens the economic foundation of Rawness — creating a healthy, resilient farm economy alongside the hospitality side of our model.
It brings vitality and authenticity to every stay: guests see and feel the dynamic interplay of all regenerative systems in action.
The transition toward a regenerative economy
The global transition toward a regenerative economy has only just begun, and places like Monte Ferrenho serve as bioregional hubs where this transformation becomes tangible.
''The more such living models exist, the smoother and faster the shift can unfold.''
Rawness stays will naturally attract two types of visitors — those seeking a high-end regenerative hospitality experience surrounded by beauty and biodiversity, and those who wish to learn, to root themselves in this way of life, and to take it home.
It allows each person to discover what resonates most deeply: the hospitality side, the farming side, or perhaps a balance of both — a personal homestead life, lived with abundance and harmony.
The Rawness principles are universal and replicable
Each stay becomes both a destination and a seed — a living proof that regeneration can be experienced, practiced, and multiplied across the world.
Building the Heart of Regeneration
We begin simply
The first stage is a robust open wooden structure with a protective roof and a functional outdoor kitchen — complete with a wood-fired pizza oven and open-fire cooking areas — allowing guests to use this space for shared meals, creative workshops, and small events alongside the farmhouse.
No lavish finishes or complex architecture — only the essentials to come together, create, and connect. From there, the Hub will grow organically, step by step, funded entirely by the abundance that Monte Ferrenho itself creates.
Each year, part of the profits from the stay and farm will flow directly into expanding and refining the Hub — with guests actively involved through the workshops we host. Over time, these contributions will culminate in a 129 m² Agricultural Building & Community Hub, built with natural materials, rammed-earth walls, and rooted in the traditional Alentejo style that honours the land.
When completed, this Hub will stand at the centre of 11.6 hectares of regenerated landscape: avocado, orange, lemon, mandarin, fig, plum, apple, pear, nectarine, peach, olive, and walnut trees surrounding a thriving garden of herbs, vegetables, and berries.
It will create an ecosystem of abundance — providing guests and local residents alike with regeneratively grown produce, reconnecting everyone to the source of nourishment.
What makes this process truly regenerative is how it is financed
We build it not through external capital or dilution of investor shares, but through the wealth the land itself generates. Every stay, every workshop, every harvest contributes to its creation.
Each guest who experiences Monte Ferrenho becomes part of building the very infrastructure that sustains it. This is not just a building — it is a living promise.
Self-financed, self-sustaining, and ever-growing — a tangible blueprint of how Rawness transforms vision into vitality, letting each season of abundance fund the next.
Our Partners
Elevating Regenerative Stays to Perfection
United Designers
Crafting a Regenerative Future for Monte Ferrenho
A Vision for Regenerative Design
We are excited to collaborate with United Designers, a global collective of ecological designers and consultants dedicated to transforming our interaction with the land. Founded by Daniel Halsey and Weruschca Kirkegaard, United Designers International brings together a group of the world's best designers, united by a passion for creating resilient, nature-based solutions. Their mission is to raise the planet’s carrying capacity through regenerative design, ensuring abundant food production and ecological harmony in the face of climate change, politics, or extreme weather.
Innovative Approaches to Landscape Transformation
United Designers will craft a landscape masterplan for Monte Ferrenho that aligns with our regenerative principles. Their approach starts with a profound understanding of the land, its resources, needs, and potential. By integrating advanced tools like GIS modeling, drone mapping, and soil health assessments, they ensure designs that enhance biodiversity, restore ecosystems, and promote long-term resilience. Their worldwide projects speak for themselves, showcasing a vast breadth of expertise across the regenerative space, from food forests to community-driven ecological systems.
Partnering for Impact and Accountability
What draws us to United Designers is their collaborative spirit, global perspective, and commitment to the regenerative movement. Their multicultural team, spanning languages and cultures, creates solutions tailored to each project's environmental and cultural context. As we embark on this partnership, we're inspired by their belief that the land shapes us, guiding Monte Ferrenho toward a future where beauty, functionality, and nature coexist in harmony.
Campo Culture
Creating a Regenerative Future
Campo Culture | Andy Szymanowicz
Campo Culture, led by Andy Szymanowicz, is a visionary force in regenerative landscape design, poised to shape the future of Monte Ferrenho in Portugal’s Alentejo region. With over 20 years of experience creating landscapes, farms, and gardens across Southern Europe, Andy and his team bring a profound commitment to healing the Earth through innovative, regenerative practices. Their work, such as the transformative La Granja Ibiza, blends beauty, functionality, and ecological vitality, making them an ideal partner for Rawness’s mission to redefine hospitality and stewardship.
A Philosophy of Regeneration
Campo Culture’s approach is rooted in a powerful conviction: sustainability alone is no longer enough. As Andy puts it, “We have the tools and intuition to live in harmony with nature, tools that yield healthy plants and support thriving forests.” Their designs go beyond preservation, actively restoring soil health, promoting biodiversity, and creating resilient ecosystems. By focusing on small-scale, organic farming and polyculture systems, they produce seasonal, nutrient-rich crops without waste while fostering thriving habitats for pollinators and native species.
Through workshops, courses, and community events in partnership with Friends of a Farmer in Setúbal, Portugal, a regenerative farm that is part of Slowness, Campo Culture builds bridges between people and the land, inspiring a shared commitment to a regenerative future.
Shaping Monte Ferrenho’s Landscape
Campo Culture will collaborate on the implementation of Monte Ferrenho’s landscape design, developed by United Designers, and serve as a sparring partner to ensure the design optimally applies regenerative principles. Andy and his team will be responsible for project management, implementation, installation, and training the local team, creating lush gardens around the regenerative farmhouses. These gardens will supply organic vegetables and fruits for guests, local communities, and restaurants, demonstrating how regenerative agriculture enhances biodiversity and contributes to a regenerative economic model.
A Partnership for a Thriving Future
Campo Culture’s expertise, creativity, and passion for regeneration make them a cornerstone of Rawness’s vision. Their ability to craft living systems that nurture both people and the planet aligns perfectly with our goal of creating a sanctuary where nature, wellness, and community converge. Together, we’re building a model of what’s possible when we work in harmony with the Earth.
Examples in Alentejo, Portugal
Below are a few examples of projects that we find inspiring and that sketch a picture of what is happening in the beautiful Alentejo regarding hospitality and regenerative farming projects.
Helder Farm Studios
Helder Farm Studios is a private stay in southern Alentejo, focused on rest, reflection, and creativity. It offers simple, timeless spaces for a deep connection with the countryside, including culinary retreats and experiences in art and food, founded by Esmee and Laurens with backgrounds in photography, film, and hospitality.
Bode Country House
Bode Country House is a boutique hotel in the foothills of the historic village of Monsanto in Alentejo, combining timeless elegance with rustic simplicity. It emphasizes understated luxury and an artistic, historical ambiance, focusing on the connection between past and present, inspired by local goats and the regional character.
Is for sale 1,75 million
Casa da Volta
Casa da Volta is an exclusive private villa in Grândola, Alentejo, on 20 hectares surrounded by cork oaks and cows, 1.5 hours from Lisbon and 30 minutes from Atlantic beaches. It redefines rural living with contemporary design, aimed at isolation and memorable experiences that encourage guests to return.
Cucumbi
Cucumbi is a private stay in Alentejo with a strong connection to nature, including accommodations named after local animals, a saltwater pool, and activities like hiking, cooking, and harvesting. It emphasizes rest, wildlife observation, and pure air, with regenerative elements through community- and nature-oriented experiences.
Friends of a Farmer
Friends of a Farmer is a regenerative farm in Herdade do Meco, Alentejo, launched in 2021 as an initiative for slow living. It focuses on soil regeneration, seasonal organic products, workshops on soil health, guided harvests, and a farmers' market in Lisbon, with a community-supported approach for sustainable lifestyles. Friends of a Farmer is a Slowness initiative.
Created by Campo Culture
Monte Silveira farm
Spanning over 700 hectares, Monte Silveira is not just a homestead, but a living example of the profound connection between man and the natural world. Practising organic certified farming since 1999, Monte Silveira has been on a continuous journey of evolution, driven by a solid commitment to soil care, promotion of biodiversity and ecosystem regeneration.
Also named in Top 50 Farmers
Casa no Tempo
Casa no Tempo is a private stay in Alentejo near Montemor-o-Novo, part of Herdade no Tempo, with four suites, a large pool, and a modern kitchen. Restored by architect Manuel Aires Mateus, it connects family heritage with regenerative agriculture, delivering exceptional products and exclusive bookings for up to 8 guests.
Terramay
Terramay is a regenerative farm on the banks of Alqueva in Alentejo, focused on soil health, food awareness, and combating desertification. It produces organic products without GMOs and offers workshops, retreats, horseback riding, picnics, and sustainable gastronomy through restaurants like Raya and Pão & Pizza, with an emphasis on ecosystem regeneration and local culture.
The Lemon Lodge
The Lemon Lodge is a small-scale organic farmstead located between the mountains and beaches of the Algarve (bordering Alentejo), offering eco-friendly, off-grid accommodations like Ziggurat, Tikka, and Mogadazu for guests to disconnect and reconnect with nature. It emphasizes regenerative living through natural, sustainable stays with rustic interiors and valley views.
Is for sale 1,45 million