Deliberately overwhelming
Walls and ceilings covered entirely in gilded carving and religious pieces.
Joehawkins — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Pedro Ribeiro Simões from Lisboa, Portugal — CC BY 2.0 · Joehawkins — CC BY-SA 4.0
If religious art or collectors' houses interest you, yes. On a short visit to Porto, the Ribeira, the cathedral, Livraria Lello, the Clérigos Tower and Serralves clearly come first. This suits a third or fourth day.
Both are house museums given by their owners, but Teixeira Lopes is about a sculptor and his studio, and this is about a collector and his taste. The first explains how art is made; the second how it is gathered.
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A collector's house preserved as he left it, the home of the Portuguese poet and collector Fernando de Castro, who gave it and its contents to the city on his death in 1946. What distinguishes it is that it is not an ordered museum but a deliberately crowded house: the walls and ceilings are covered entirely in gilded woodcarving, religious pieces, statues and paintings, packed at a density that is almost oppressive. This is the collector's own taste rather than a curator's choice, and it is what makes the visit different. The collection concentrates on Portuguese religious art — saints' figures, altarpieces and gilded work from churches and monasteries, much of it saved when religious buildings were demolished or stripped in the nineteenth century. The museum is small and slightly outside the centre in the Costa Cabral district, quiet and rarely crowded. It suits anyone interested in religious art or in collectors' houses, rather than being a priority on a short visit.
Walls and ceilings covered entirely in gilded carving and religious pieces.
Much of the collection came from churches and monasteries stripped or demolished in the nineteenth century.
You see one man's taste as he lived in it, which is rare in museums.
Rua Costa Cabral, Porto