A Blue-Chip Investment

Palácio Fronteira, near Lisbon, Portugal More than 60,000 tiles have gone into the creation of this extraordinary 17th-century garden, which has survived kings and earthquakes, and they still gleam as bright as on the day they were laid, says Gerald Luckhurst

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TWO pavilions, glowing in the bright sunshine of the early morning, stand out against the clearblue Portuguese sky. Today is one of those days on which winter seems to have succumbed to the onset of the coming spring and the garden at the Palácio dos Marqueses de Fronteira, the Lisbon home of Dom José de Mascarenhas, sparkles with a brilliance that belies the three and a half centuries that have passed since it was first built. Such is the magic of the azulejos, the glazed painted tiles that are so characteristic of Portuguese gardens from the 17th and 18th centuries.

Fronteira is perhaps the supreme example. Unchanged by fashion, untouched by the 1755 earthquake that destroyed so much of Lisbon’s built heritage, the tile panels at Fronteira can make a visit to this historic house and garden a walk into a scene of everlasting vitality.

The blue-and-white ceramic discs came from a dinner service that was deliberately broken after one use

More than 60,000 tiles have survived almost unblemished from a building campaign initiated in 1665 and completed by 1678. In fact, the remarkable thing about Fronteira is that the 17th-century garden has come down to us in its entirety, practically unaltered since this time.

Of course, some things have changed: the house was extended in the 18th century, trees have come and gone, box hedging has almost certainly been renovated and grown fat, the 17th-century Dutch lead statuary has suffered from severe metal fatigue and the fountains may not run with quite the same exuberant enthusiasm of their youth, but everything is still there and, with respect to the tiles, looking as if brand spanking new.