Vision to reality – creating a new hotel
Back in 2011
Every Interaction partnered with branding agency Winkreative on a transformative project for property developer Jose Antonio Uva. The goal was communicating his vision for revitalizing Sao Lourenco do Barrocal, a family estate in Portugal's Alentejo region that had stood in ruins for decades but would eventually become a luxury hotel opening in early 2016.
The Back Story
The estate, purchased from the King in 1820, originally served as a self-sustaining home for a rural farming community. Located near Monsaraz and alongside the Alqueva dam, the landscape features rocky outcrops, olive trees, wildflowers, vineyards, and long-horned cattle. Ancient stone monoliths reflect the region's neolithic heritage, informing the vision for the estate's future centered on family, culture, and community harmony.
The Plan
The Monte, the old village center, would transform into a hotel with surrounding estate plots for private residences. Drawing inspiration from California's Sea Ranch, the development emphasized open land without picket fences or imposing villas. Pritzker Prize-winning architect Eduardo Souto de Moura designed the architectural framework guiding all construction.
The Hotel
Restoration involved painstakingly repairing ruined buildings with original terracotta roof tiles sourced nationwide. Portuguese craftsmen lived on-site throughout construction, restoring vaulted ceilings and walls. Interior conversions transformed oil pressing rooms into event spaces and a defunct bakery into a winery. The central cobbled street became a row of hotel rooms and cottages.
Interior design blended curated Portuguese antique furniture with local ceramics and contemporary lighting from selected collaborators. A new restaurant building featured seasonal produce from an ambitious walled vegetable garden surrounded by olive and lemon groves. The swimming pool and stables sat between the hotel and garden, with activities, workshops, and events planned to feed "mind, body and soul."
Website Phase One
Winkreative created a new identity alongside an illustrated investor book. Filmmaker Graham Clayton-Chance produced films capturing the region's spirit, featuring interviews with architects John Pawson and Eduardo Souto de Moura, plus landscape architect Joao Gomes da Silva. This initial work helped secure European Commission funding.
Five Years Later
Jose approached Every Interaction to build a next-generation website with booking capabilities. The primary challenge: construction wouldn't complete until December, while the site needed launching in April. The team conducted card sorting exercises to organize content and sketched every page to understand priorities.
Tech Behind the Scenes
Research focused on booking engines and property management systems (PMS). Every Interaction used client InsightBee to research the market, discovering that most established systems appeared dated, bloated, and offered minimal customization. Few were responsive or cohesive with main websites.
The team selected Portuguese company Guest Centric for their API, enabling custom booking process design. They built the site on Zend Framework for a multilingual CMS easily integrating with the booking system. A Shopify e-commerce shop was also integrated for selling hotel-sourced products.
Visual Design
The team created a visual design system providing layout variety while maintaining underlying consistency. A modular approach ensured pages felt distinct yet unified. Over fifty percent of the initial site contained placeholder imagery representing educated guesses about final aesthetics, with images guiding photographer direction.
Open for Business
Since December 2015 launch, the hotel has flourished as video, images, and content sections expanded. The site continues evolving while settling into the Alentejo's rhythm—"a place where life is calm, beautiful and thoughtful."
Client Testimonials
Jose A Uva praised Every Interaction's combination of "state-of-the-art web design" with "narrative, journalistic approach," noting their ability to "tell content-driven stories" and implement them technologically.
Marketing Director Susana Lourenco described them as delivering "smart and thoughtful solutions" for luxury hospitality challenges, calling them "trustworthy partners and part of our team."