Estoi () is a former

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...

in the municipality of Faro, in the

Algarve The Algarve (, , ; from ) is the southernmost NUTS II region of continental Portugal. It has an area of with 467,495 permanent inhabitants and incorporates 16 municipalities ( ''concelhos'' or ''municípios'' in Portuguese). The region has it ...

, Portugal. In 2013, the parish merged into the new parish

Conceição e Estoi Conceição e Estoi is a civil parish in the municipality of Faro, part of the Portuguese Algarve, formed in 2013 from the merger of the former parishes Conceição and Estoi. The population in 2011 was 8,176,

Geography

Estoi is a village and parish in the municipality of Faro, a rural zone that extends from the fertile fields of ''Campina de Faro'', until the peaks of Serra do Monte Figo (Cerros de São Miguel, Azinheiro, Malhão, Bemposta, Monteiro and Guelhim), that have been, since antiquity, beacons for navigation and natural outlooks along the coast of the Algarvian Riviera.

Architecture

The Palace of Estoi is a rococo building renowned for its gardens and

azulejo ''Azulejo'' (, ; from the Arabic ''al- zillīj'', ) is a form of Spanish and Portuguese painted tin-glazed ceramic tilework. ''Azulejos'' are found on the interior and exterior of churches, palaces, ordinary houses, schools, and nowadays, r ...

s (blue and white tiled ceramic). The palace was built in the late 19th century and is the finest example of this kind of architecture in the district of Faro. In the centre of the town is the neoclassical Igreja Matriz de Estoi. An original church at the site dates to the 15th century, but it was significantly damaged following the 1755 earthquake. It would later be restored, and then in the 19th century it would be further updated in neoclassical style. The architect was an Italian named Francisco Xavier Fabri. Other examples of his work are located in nearby towns, most notably the Arco de Vila in Faro. Just west of this small town, in the vicinity of Estoi, is a ruined Roman villa of Milreu which provides a rare opportunity to see how Romans lived in the 1st-century-AD to the 4th-century-AD . The ruins reveal the characteristic form of a peristyle villa, with a gallery of columns around a courtyard. The excavations brought to light an extensive Roman villa with adjacent buildings. The villa ruins of Milreu show that the area was already populated in Roman times.

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External links

{{Authority control Parishes of Faro, Portugal Roman towns and cities in Portugal Former parishes of Portugal