Miradouro da Senhora do Monte: Lisbon From the Top
Why is it significant?
Lean on the low wall under the trees and let the whole city spread out below you: the castle on its hill straight ahead, the red roofs tumbling down to the river, and far off, the long red bridge over the Tagus. Nowhere in Lisbon gives you more of it at once.
Key Facts
| Place | Miradouro da Senhora do Monte: Lisbon From the Top |
|---|---|
| Address | Rua da Senhora do Monte, 1170 Lisboa, Portugal |
| Geo Coordinates | 38.71910, -9.13290 |
| Part of Walk | Lisbon in Blue and White: Graça, São Vicente & the Azulejo Trail |
| Generated | Generated |
Lean on the low wall under the trees and let the whole city spread out below you: the castle on its hill straight ahead, the red roofs tumbling down to the river, and far off, the long red bridge over the Tagus. Nowhere in Lisbon gives you more of it at once. This is the highest of the city's miradouros.
Now look at what the city is actually made of. Thousands of façades, and on so many of them, a shimmer, as if the walls were wet. That shine is glazed tile, the azulejo. The word probably comes from the Arabic for a small polished stone, and the craft came to Portugal from Muslim Spain more than five hundred years ago. Lisbon took it and never let go: on churches, palaces, kitchens, stations, butchers' shops and ordinary apartment blocks.
Behind you is the little hermitage of Nossa Senhora do Monte. Tradition says a chapel stood here soon after the Christian conquest of Lisbon in 1147. Inside, the story goes, is a stone chair once used by São Gens, a legendary early bishop of the city... and for centuries pregnant women, queens among them, came to sit in it, hoping for an easy birth.
Painters love this terrace for a simple reason: the light. Lisbon's light bounces off the river and the pale stone, so colours look washed and bright at the same time, and in the late afternoon the whole city turns gold, then pink. Hold that palette in your mind, the white, the ochre, the blue, because you are about to see it again and again, fired into clay.
This walk follows the azulejo from the most humble wall to the greatest museum of tiles in the world. It begins right behind you, in a workers' village built by a confectioner with a passion for stars. Walk north along the street for a couple of minutes and look for a gate with a star on it.