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Tiago Máximo

@tiago.maximo

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Maximo Properties
Rural land & ruins · Southwest Portugal
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This property didn’t catch my attention because of the size of the ruin.

Nor because of the square metres.

It caught my attention because of how it feels when you stand there.

Almost 4 hectares of gently rolling hills, scattered cork oaks, enough privacy, and a legally registered pre-1951 ruin waiting for a new chapter.

In a market where many properties try to become large tourism developments, Vale Meadas follows the opposite path.

Simple.
Honest.
Human-scaled.

The concept shown in this video is not about transforming the landscape. It is about integrating into it.

Just 5 minutes from Odemira and around 25 minutes from the beaches of the Alentejo Coast.

Vale Meadas
3.98 hectares
Registered pre-1951 ruin
Architectural project already developed
Asking price: €320,000

For someone looking to build a home in the countryside rather than a speculative mega-project.

Send me a Direct Message with “VALE MEADAS” for further information. taken in Costa Alentejana by @tiago.maximo

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4 months ago

There’s a type of architecture I admire more than any other.

Not the one that tries to dominate the landscape.

The one that feels like it has always belonged there.

This concept follows a simple philosophy: preserve the existing footprint, respect the proportions, use honest materials, and let the courtyard become the heart of the home.

White lime walls.
Traditional clay roof tiles.
Solid timber.
Natural stone.
A restrained palette that allows light, shadow and vegetation to do most of the work.

The pool isn’t the main feature.
The architecture isn’t trying to be iconic.
Nothing is shouting for attention.

Everything works together.

To me, this is what timeless architecture looks like.

A house that could have been built a hundred years ago…
or a hundred years from now. taken in Costa Alentejana by @tiago.maximo

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3 months ago

This is not just a property.

This is a private 38-hectare estate in the Southwest Alentejo — riverfront, complete privacy, and a rare opportunity to create something truly unique.

A legal ruin sits at the heart of the estate, with an approved path forward already in place.

In this region, it’s not about how much you can build.
It’s about what is already possible.

And this one is.

I’m currently preparing all the details.

If this resonates with you, send me a message with “ESPARGAL”. taken in Costa Alentejana by @tiago.maximo

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5 months ago

Porto Covo, 1952.

Before tourism, before the restaurants, before the summer crowds.

Just a small wooden boat, the Atlantic, and men who made their living from the sea.

Fishing here was never romantic. It was cold, physical, uncertain work. But there is something undeniably heroic in watching an ordinary man face the ocean because that was simply his job.

This is how I imagine one morning off the coast of Porto Covo in 1952.

ALENTEJO, 1952 — THE SEA taken in Costa Alentejana by @tiago.maximo

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a month ago

Alentejo, 1952.

Today, we load the car, close the boot and drive away.

Back then, in many parts of rural Alentejo, a working day could begin by preparing a donkey.

The saddle had to be adjusted, the baskets balanced, the ropes tightened, and only then could the journey begin.

For many families, the donkey was not part of the scenery.

It was transport.
It carried water, food, tools, firewood, crops — sometimes almost everything that needed to move.

This is not the reconstruction of one specific person or place.

It is simply how I imagine one ordinary morning in rural Alentejo, 1952, based on the stories, photographs and memories that survived.

Alentejo, 1952 — The Donkey. taken in Costa Alentejana by @tiago.maximo

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a month ago

Alentejo, 1952.

A piece of bread in a child’s hands.

It looks like nothing. But for many families, it was everything.

Bread stretched the soup, filled the stomach and made a poor meal feel a little less poor. It was made to last, and not a crumb was thrown away.

Behind every loaf were hours of work. Kneading, waiting, baking — often enough bread for the entire week.

Perhaps that is why older generations still have such respect for it. Why they never leave it upside down on the table. Why wasting bread still feels almost like a sin.

This is not the story of one specific family. It is simply how I imagine an ordinary moment in rural Alentejo, based on the memories and habits that survived.

Alentejo, 1952 — The Bread. taken in Costa Alentejana by @tiago.maximo

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a month ago

Alentejo, 1952.

Today, we turn on a tap, splash some water on our face and start the day.

We don’t even think about it.

But a little over 70 years ago, in many parts of rural Alentejo, something as simple as washing your face could begin with a walk to the well.

Water had to be fetched, carried home, saved and used carefully.

No tap. No running water. No endless supply.

Just another small detail of everyday life that reminds us how much the world has changed in such a short time.

This is not a reconstruction of one specific person or place. It is simply how I imagine a morning in Alentejo, 1952, based on the stories and memories that survived.

Alentejo, 1952 — The Water. by @tiago.maximo

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a month ago

ALENTEJO, 1952.

I wasn’t there.

This is simply how I imagine it.

Built from the stories I’ve heard all my life. Stories of people working the land, small villages, long walks, hard lives and a very different relationship with time.

No phones. No cars for most people. Very little money. Life happened mostly within a few kilometres from home.

I’m not trying to recreate history perfectly. I can’t.

This is an interpretation of a place and a time I never knew, made from old photographs, stories, memories passed from one generation to another… and a bit of imagination.

For the first time, instead of imagining what an old ruin could become, I wanted to imagine what this land might have looked and felt like before I was here.

Alentejo, 1952. Or at least, the way I imagine it.

If you or your family remember the Alentejo of those years, tell me what I got right — and what I got completely wrong. by @tiago.maximo

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a month ago

This was actually a property I had for sale some time ago, and eventually sold. One of my favourites, but also one that gave me quite a fight.

The buyer had many doubts about what could actually be done here, so I created this little exercise simply to show the potential I could see in the place.

Nothing extravagant. No major changes to the original volume of the house. Just restoring what was already there, keeping the traditional local language, adding a small protected courtyard and pool, and trying to make the house disappear into the landscape rather than compete with it.

After almost 40 days on the road through Europe and beyond, one thing that really stayed with me is the relationship between architecture and nature.

In Spain, France, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Bulgaria, Turkey and Georgia, I kept seeing buildings working around the existing landscape. Trees incredibly close to houses. Old trees incorporated into courtyards. Buildings adapting their shape because something worth preserving was already there.

If an old tree stands where you want to build, sometimes the challenge for the architect is to find a way around it. The tree becomes part of the project.

I love that idea.

In Portugal, particularly in rural areas and especially because of wildfire regulations, the reality is obviously more complicated. Safety distances and vegetation management exist for very good reasons. But sometimes I feel we have gone so far in separating buildings from vegetation that we have also lost some of that intimacy between a house and the landscape around it.

I don’t think architecture and nature should be enemies.

So even when these are only exercises of imagination, I will probably always put the trees back in.

Because for me, a house like this without the nature around it would lose half of what makes it special.

Just a reimagination. The final image is not an approved project and does not represent what can legally be built on the property. taken in Costa Alentejana by @tiago.maximo

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a month ago

40 nights on the road.

And somewhere along the way, I started thinking about something I hadn’t really considered before we left: the importance of home in the growth of a child.

There are definitely beautiful things about travelling with a baby this young.

She sees new places every day. New faces, new sounds, new smells, new languages. She has been passed from arms to arms, smiled at by strangers from so many different countries, and somehow she seems completely comfortable with it. She welcomes people into her space without fear.

I love that.

But lately I’ve started noticing the other side of it.

Maybe she is also beginning to miss something she can’t yet explain: familiarity. The same room. The same bed. The same sounds in the morning. A place she recognises as home, where she knows what comes next.

We are now 40 nights into this journey and, in this last stretch, we often don’t even know where we will sleep the following night.

Strangely, we’ve become comfortable with that.

We keep moving, trusting that something will appear, that the road will take us where we need to go and that somehow the universe will guide us safely to the next stop.

I actually think there is something valuable in learning to live like that. To trust a little more and control a little less.

But then I look at her and wonder:

We like living this way… but does she?

Maybe one of the things this journey is teaching me is that adventure can shape a child — but perhaps roots are what give her the confidence to explore it.

And after 40 nights on the road, home is starting to feel less like a place we return to…

and more like something we need to give her. taken in Barcelonnette by @tiago.maximo

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a month ago

Tbilisi was melting.

37°C, heavy air, burning streets. The kind of heat that makes you slow down and simply wait for the day to pass.

And then, almost in an instant, everything changed.

The sky turned dark. The temperature dropped. Rain filled the streets and suddenly the colours of the city became deeper, the air felt different and Tbilisi seemed like another place entirely.

Somehow, we went from summer to winter in the East in a matter of minutes.

These little transitions usually happen without us really noticing them.

This time, we were lucky enough to have the camera rolling.

And for a few minutes, we watched an entire city change in front of us.

Tbilisi, Georgia. taken in Tbilisi, Georgia by @tiago.maximo

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2 months ago

Three months ago, I lost my father.

Five months ago, I became one.

And somewhere between those two moments, my understanding of love changed completely.

I always knew my father loved me. But only now, holding my own daughter in my arms, do I begin to understand what that really meant.

The instinct to protect her.
The responsibility.
The fear.
The pride.
The ridiculous amount of love you can feel for another human being simply because she exists.

Sometimes I look at her and wonder if my father once looked at me exactly the same way.

There are things I wish I could ask him now. Things I would understand differently. Conversations I thought there would always be time for.

There wasn’t.

But perhaps this is part of what we leave behind.

A little of my father lives in me. And inevitably, a little of him will live in her too.

I miss you, Dad.

And now I understand you a little better. taken in Black Sea by @tiago.maximo

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2 months ago