Arrábida Natural Park, 45 minutes south of Lisbon
Slow Co Farm
An off-grid home, already built, looking for the right people to live in it.
The next chapter
The farm is ready for its next chapter
We’re Rik and Hen. For the last eight years we’ve been slowly building an off-grid farm in Arrábida Natural Park, 45 minutes south of Lisbon. It started as an empty agricultural plot, close to desertification. Over the next five years we transformed it into a regenerative space to learn, live, work and play. Then it became our family home when our daughter was born. Last month we got married there.
Our daughter is now three, we’ve outgrown the yurt as a family, and we’ve moved to a nearby town. The farm is ready for its next chapter. And we’re looking for the right people to live there.
Who we’re looking for
Honestly? Pretty much who we were ten years ago
People in their late twenties or thirties. Maybe a couple, maybe a small group of friends. With remote work that pays the bills, but a growing suspicion that there might be a different way to live.
Curious about slow living, off-grid systems, growing things, hosting friends, chilling in a hammock, watching the seasons turn. But not quite ready to start from scratch on bare land in the middle of nowhere.
This place is already built. The hard years are behind it. You’d just be moving in and living.
What’s here
Everything you need, already here
- A heated yurt with pellet burner, AC, hot water, walk-in shower, comfy bed, big sofa, kitchenette, compost loo and Starlink. Sleeps two adults very comfortably, or two adults and a small child.
- A cosy caravan with heating. Room for one or two more in your group, or visiting friends.
- Loads of mature fruit trees, vegetable beds with a log path, a small vineyard to make your own wine, three big cork trees for summer shade, a pool, pine forest, and a newly built communal kitchen for hosting people.
- A well with two pumps, water filtration and UV sterilisation. A stream with a natural spring source two minutes down the road. Solar system with batteries. Compost toilets. Greywater systems. The lot.
- Two cats (Blue and Thai) who'd love your company.
- Twenty-five minutes' walk to the bus and cafe. Twenty minutes' drive to the beaches at Arrábida, and to Azeitão or Sesimbra.
The lifestyle
It’s all here if you want it
Hiking, mountain biking, SUP, paragliding, surfing, snorkelling, free diving, pilates, dinners under the cork tree, full moon swims, sunset on the Atlantic.
Wine country one side, mountains and ocean the other. Lisbon when you want it, nature when you don’t.
The community here is lovely. Local Portuguese in the nearby village are super friendly, and there’s a great international community: British, Dutch, French, German and Belgian folks living nearby. People who’d happily come for a BBQ, lend you a tool, or feed the cat for the weekend.
The arrangement
A longer-term lease
Six months minimum, ideally a year or more. You’d be living independently. We’ll be around to help maintain the space, fix what breaks and take care of things you can’t, but we’re not looking to be your social life and we won’t be in the way.
The farm is yours to live in, host friends in, grow things in, throw small gatherings in. Make it your home.
Room to do more too if that’s your thing. Events, food growing, hosting retreats, workaways, putting up your own space. We’ve done all of it and will happily share what we’ve learnt. Zero obligation though.
If the dream is “slow down, enjoy nature, work my online job”, you’re equally welcome.
About us
Rik, Hen and Joy
Rik (English) is a freelance consultant by day, a disco-dancing DJ by weekend, and a fixer of broken things. Hen (Swedish) is a massage therapist and designer, the warm centre of every gathering. Our daughter Joy is three and will absolutely want to come and pick berries with you when we visit.
We’ve spent the better part of a decade making this place what it is. We’re not handing it over carelessly. We’re looking for people we’d happily share a long evening with, who’d treat it like their own, and who get what the farm is.
Get in touch
Want to know more?
Tell us a bit about who you are, what you do, and what the next year or two of your life might look like.
The yurt is open on Airbnb this summer if you want to come and stay first, feel the place out before anything’s decided. That’s a really easy way in.
Come and play.
Love Hen and Rik xx