Rustic Chic to Boutique
In 1981 Denise and Hans Kortekaas bought a holiday home in Lagos, 27 years later their daughter re-modelled the property into a boutique hotel. What happened in between is a heart-warming family history which has evolved around the Quinta´s thick white walls, which climb up the hillside, offering an array of terraces and verandas with far-reaching views.
Denise and her Dutch husband, Hans, ran a successful tour operating business from Richmond in the UK. They craved more sunshine and the area around Lagos reminded Denise, originally from Zimbabwe, of her homeland and offered a similar amount of sunshine!
The property, located on the Matos Morenos ridge, between Luz and Lagos, was made into a house in 1972 by a Yorkshire couple and at that time was the only property on the ridge, having originally been the site of a farm. They misnamed the property “Quinta Bonita” understanding it to mean “beautiful estate” although in Portuguese “bonita” is normally only used in Portuguese to describe a woman!
Hans recalls of this time; “There was then no development between here and the old town of Lagos. The shepherd grazed his cattle on the land surrounding the Quinta and there was nothing to be seen between the old Portuguese farms at the top of the ridge and the Monchique hills in the distance. The air would ring with cowbells and we kept one for years as a memento of this time.”
They had one of the first telephones in the whole area and can recall a time when people used to knock on the door and ask to look at it, as it was such a novelty. Their daughter, Chantelle, who was then 7 remembers; “We would stay in the Quinta every school holidays, I would always come with a friend and I remember lots of BBQ´s in the pool house, playing in the gardens and the excitement of visiting the grottos in one of the old fishing boats. Then in my teens, my mother invited four of my friends to come and stay and in return, we had to paint the whole property! She would ring the old cowbell outside our bedroom doors every morning to get us up to begin work!”
The Quinta became a family hobby with Denise and Hans, who are keen gardeners, creating the now much-admired grounds which cover 10,000 sq ms and create an atmosphere of tranquility for guests. They planted the Italian garden by hand, establishing over 1500 plant in this section alone. Walls were built around the perimeter and the former farm building was converted into a cottage.
They purchased the furniture over time with their first item being a marble table which they sourced from a slab of rock chosen directly from the marble factory and a made to measure sideboard hand carved by a Portuguese carpenter, along with a giant-sized chess set to keep Hans and his guests entertained in the garden. In the days before “Owners Direct” Hans and Denise would rent out the villa while they were not there but would often request meeting the tenants in the UK first to ensure they were suitable!
Hans still regularly stays in the cottage and potters around the gardens with the help of Manuel who has been with the family since 1993. It is dominated by a huge Olive tree which gives protection from the beating summer sun to the seating areas below. The orchard includes figs, loquats, grapevines, citrus, cherries and avocados which now provide the hotel guests with fruit dishes and home-made cakes throughout the year. He has annotated every species so guests can explore the gardens and identify each plant.
Denise always loved hosting and filling the home with friends and family. She recalls; “At this time there were no large supermarket chains. I remember being incredibly excited when a convenience store opened where Tezenis is now in Lagos. Before that we used to visit the farm to buy milk and our suitcases would always be packed full of supplies when we arrived.”
This was taken to an extreme when they needed a lawn mower to cultivate their new lawns but were unable to purchase one in Lagos and so they took one apart and fitted it into a suitcase to transport to the Quinta, causing great confusion to the customs officials at the airport who were unsure what the contraption was!
In the days before budget airlines scheduled flights were rare and expensive and so Hans and Denise would go to Faro airport and try to get onto a charter flight when there were empty seats and Chantelle remembers having to sleep in the hire car overnight when the gamble was not successful! There is no doubt that the Kortekaas´s were one of the first pioneers of the 2nd home market in the Algarve and their love for travel is reflected in the momentos you still see around the Quinta.
Cut to 2007, the Quinta was now no longer being used so much by the family with Chantelle now in her ´30s an events manager in Sydney living with her Scottish Partner, Fraser Lindsay a fanatical mountain biker, who ran a bike shop.
The property was becoming tired and was now too much work for Hans and Denise, who with regret put the property on the market. Chantelle and Fraser had an interest in travel and in their ´20s had loved staying in boutique hotels and had even started a folder of clippings from places they had stayed;
“Starting a B&B was always something we thought we would do when we were older;” recalls Chantelle; “but when we heard Quinta Bonita was on the market an idea started to form!”
“As a family that had worked in hospitality, tourism, event management, interior design and retail we felt we had the right skill sets to make this work and now a property to do it with. We sold up in Sydney and Scotland to fund the project.”
In 2009 the whole family embarked on a building programme, which would have given Grand Designs a run for its money! They had plans drawn up by a local architect to transform the private home into an 8 bedroom boutique hotel while trying to retain the integrity of the much loved Quinta. “We wanted to maintain the Quinta Bonita’s laid back and friendly atmosphere so that people instantly feel at home and relaxed whilst having their every need catered for. Our mantra is laid-back luxury,” explains Chantelle.
The building work started in October 2009 and Denise managed the interior design for the couple who were still in Sydney. Hans worked tirelessly in the garden, Willie, Fraser´s step Dad (conveniently a civil engineer) re-built the external bathroom and a group of friends even flew over for a working holiday to paint the external walls! Chantelle and Fraser moved to Portugal in into the old cottage at the beginning of 2010, so they could live on site.
There were many challenges, including the language barrier, with the couple becoming experts in sign language! A major set back was that while the roof was off the Algarve experienced the wettest winter since 1870! “It was a challenging time;” laughs Chantelle, “We welcomed our first guests in June 2010 and we literally kicked the builders out an hour before the first guests arrived. We learnt to practice patience and modify our expectations of deadlines!”
So how have the couple found the experience and do they have any regrets: “ I have at times felt a bit like Basil Fawlty, in terms of crisis management but I hope this never comes across to our guests!” grins Chantelle! “When we first opened booking.com did not have an email option for bookings so we relied on fax, but we could not find a machine locally that distinguished between a phone call or fax arriving to the hotel line. Every time the phone rang in the middle of the night we had 30 seconds to jump out of bed rush up the garden path to the hotel and press “fax” or we would lose the booking and risk being taken offline by booking.com.”
Over the years they have been open, Chantelle has used her event management experience to create a wedding venue and hosted many beautiful ceremonies in the property She is also an avid yogi and has hosted a number of yoga retreats including one for a company called “Yoga for Bad People” which she describes as “eye-opening”, with the attendees practicing yoga in g-strings!!
She has also welcomed guests with some heart-warming stories including Mary Jones who rented Quinta Bonita 25 years ago and returned 5 times. She came back to visit the hotel with her children last year including her son who, as a baby, learnt to walk at the property. Then there were the brothers who returned to the Algarve for the first time since 1973 when they were here on holiday with their father who drowned off Luz Beach while trying to save his sons who had drifted out to see in an inflatable. Chantelle tired in vain to help them find someone who might have witnessed the event and could tell them what happened. They were, however, able to find where he was buried so were able to gain some closure.
“Inevitably with the level of the sort of bespoke service we offer it is an all-consuming way of life! Two years after we opened I had my first child and then a second 18 months later, so it has been a juggling act. Our family grew out of the cottage and needed to move off-site, but we now rent it very successfully so it worked out for the best. Also whilst we have been trying to build up the business we have not been able to delegate, so I will greet guests and then run into the kitchen to wash up! However, the enjoyment people get from their holidays and from the house that I have known all my life which make it all worth it.”
It is this level of personal service that makes their guests return, Chantelle uses her years of knowledge of the Algarve to give her guests advice on the best places to visit, places to eat and off the beaten track beaches, thus enhancing their stay and giving them experiences beyond the norm.
It is clear that far from being Fawlty Towers, this new period in Quinta Bonita´s history is a fitting end to its history as a family holiday home and with Chantelle's children now 3 and 4, enjoying playing in the gardens, maybe there will be another chapter when the next generation comes of age.
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