Alcácer do Sal is an ancient salt port on the Sado, where storks nest on the chimneys and the pace takes its cue from them. It sits with the rural fields of the Alentejo on one side and the Atlantic beaches around Comporta on the other: turf inland, salt by the sea. Architecture-school sweethearts Filipa and Antonio took a century-old merchant’s townhouse above the river and restored it the way anthropologists dig, slowly and with reverence. Lime-washed whites and Mizzle greens, scarlet velvet, Urquiola and Newson beneath vintage Flos, and salvaged tiles from an old-timer maker underfoot in the courtyard.

There are seven suites, and the whole house can be taken for fourteen people, making it as good a present for a gathering as for two. Suites can also be booked individually. Gift vouchers are arranged directly with Filipa and Antonio, so the giver can settle the details with the people who restored every tile.

Salt in the morning, turf by evening, and a stork on the chimney keeping an eye on both.