Herdade do Meco

Friends of a Farmer is an initiative to regenerate our soil, awaken the farm and cultivate a community. A true Community Supported Agriculture project, Friends of a Farmer reflects a mutual commitment between farmer and consumer to support regenerative, small-scale agriculture, allowing us to thoughtfully grow high-quality, seasonal and organic produce without waste. Led by master farmer Andy Szymanowicz, it includes a weekly subscription farm box brimming with farm-fresh organic vegetables and flowers, all harvested directly from our fields in Meco, as well as community programming on and around the farm.

To celebrate the beginning of our harvest each year, we hold a farmer’s market in the Graça neighborhood of Lisbon, where we share our own crops, all grown without the use of chemicals and pesticides, as well as local and artisanal products from the region. Our wish is to foster a strong bond between our community, the farm and the local producers—to build a farm with you.

A rotating program of community-supported farming, arts and knowledge exchange aims to restore conscious appreciation for the natural world, creating a model for a regenerative society. Each weekly farm box includes a newsletter with insights into the growing process, nutritional information about our weekly offerings, best practices for storage, handling and preparation and recipe suggestions to help you make the best use out of the week’s harvest. In addition, we lead tours on the land and monthly educational workshops, from wild orchid spotting to guided tomato harvests, bringing our community into direct contact with the farmers and educating them about regenerative farming, ecosystem restoration, nutrition and holistic health.

Herdade do Meco sits within the Arrábida Natural Park, a protected area covering more than 10,000 hectares about 45 minutes down the coast from Lisbon. A region of astounding bio- and geodiversity, Arrábida encompasses diverse microclimates, vegetation, animal habitats, and unique geomorphic rock formations that tell a story stretching back millions of years.

Within close range of several storied surf spots, Herdade do Meco is flanked by two beaches of extraordinary wild beauty, Praia da Foz, where soft sands shaded by coastal cliffs sit aside a petrified volcanic plane popular with local fishermen, and Praia do Meco a long, untouched sandy beach embraced by hippies and nudists since the 1970s and 1980s.