Before Opening to Guests, São Lourenço do Barrocal Spent 14 Years Restoring Its Farm

São Lourenço do Barrocal spreads across 780 hectares near Monsaraz, in Portugal's Alentejo. The same family has held the estate for more than 200 years. In the nineteenth century, it supported up to 50 farming families, along with workshops, a schoolroom and a bullring.

The family spent 14 years restoring the farm and its buildings. They brought the olive groves and vineyards back into production, returned cattle to the land and rebuilt a vegetable garden that now covers 1 hectare. The whole estate is certified organic. In 2016, the old farm village opened to guests.

Barrocal has built its luxury around the life of the farm. The estate produces its own food: olive oil, wine, meat, fruit, vegetables and herbs. Inside, local fired bricks, old roof tiles and limewash keep the rooms part of the same place, with materials that can age alongside the building.

The farm effect is real

The “farm effect” is the name researchers give to the unusually low rates of asthma and allergies found among children raised on traditional farms.

This has been seen well beyond one village or one country. In 2011, researchers brought together 2 studies covering 16,511 children in rural parts of Central Europe. Children who lived on farms had less asthma and were exposed to a much wider range of bacteria and fungi in their bedrooms. The wider that range was, the less likely asthma became. The pattern followed microbial variety as a whole, and researchers could not pin it on a single microbe.

The Amish and Hutterite study went further. These 2 American farming communities share similar ancestry and many daily habits, yet their farms work differently. Amish families keep small traditional farms, where children live close to barns and animals. Hutterite farms are industrialised, so that close contact is largely gone.

In a 2016 study of 60 Amish and Hutterite children, asthma was 4 times less common in the Amish group. Allergic sensitisation, where the immune system reacts to common allergens, was 6 times less common. Dust collected inside Amish homes also contained 6.8 times more endotoxin, material that comes from the outer wall of certain bacteria. Farm microbes were reaching the house in far greater amounts.

Researchers then tested dust from both kinds of homes in mice. Amish dust reduced the animals' allergic lung reaction while Hutterite dust did not, showing that something in the Amish house dust could directly and positively affect the immune response.

Change the ground

In a separate study, Finnish researchers asked whether urban children could gain some of the same biological effects without moving to a farm. At 4 daycares, they replaced gravel with forest floor, turf, planters and peat blocks for digging. They left another 6 daycare yards unchanged for comparison. The researchers followed 75 children aged 3 to 5, who spent about 1.5 hours outside each weekday.

Within 28 days, the children in the greener yards had a more varied community of bacteria on their skin. The change appeared in their blood too, in markers linked with better control of immune reactions. The study showed that ordinary contact with living ground could change human biology within 1 month. A follow-up found that differences in the children's skin bacteria were still visible 1 year later, including lower levels of several potentially harmful bacteria.

We have spent decades designing nature out of homes, then selling it back as a potted ficus. A holistic home built around health needs something alive enough to touch.

At home, the idea can fit into 1 square metre. A little paving or decorative gravel can give way to good soil and finished compost, with native ground cover and herbs you want to cook with. The edible garden has more ideas for plants that will end up in food or tea.

At Barrocal, the farm reaches the table because it is still part of daily life. One square metre beside the kitchen can do something similar at home, holding herbs for dinner, a place for children to dig and living soil that people actually touch.