The classification process of Torre da Lapa, in Lagoa, as a Monument of Public Interest (MIP) is under public consultation until the 25th of October. All documentation associated with the process can be found online on the Directorate-General for Cultural Heritage’s website.
The idea of classifying this old watchtower, located in Vale da Azinhaga, in Ferragudo, Lagoa, came from the local Parish Council, then chaired by Luís Alberto. The initial intention was to classify it as a “property of municipal interest”, but, thanks to the intervention of the Lagoa Council, in specific councilwoman Anabela Simão back in 2015, the Algarve Regional Directorate of Culture decided to move the watchtower to a higher grade classification, as a “monument of public interest”.
This process was officially launched in August of 2017, with a publication in the Diário da República of the “beginning of the classification process by the Directorate General of Cultural Heritage”.
On March 20th of 2019, the Torre da Lapa Monument of Public Interest (MIP) classification procedure received a favourable opinion from the Architectural and Archaeological Heritage Section of the National Council of Culture.
The approval of Paula Araújo da Silva, Director-General of Cultural Heritage, was given on the 29th of March. Prior to that, in 2018, the Torre da Lapa was the subject of careful restoration at the initiative of the City Council, which allowed much architectural stability to be restored to this monument.
After the current public consultation process is concluded, during which any citizen may make suggestions, "there will be a final pronouncement and the respective decision of the Secretary of State for Culture". “Once the MIP classification is obtained, Torre da Lapa becomes the fourth property with a degree of interest and national safeguarding in the municipality of Lagoa, joining the São João de Arade Castle in the same parish, the Estômbar Matriz Church and the Nossa Senhora da Rocha Fort and Chapel, in Porches”, according to Lagoa Council.
Torre da Lapa “is a 16th century watchtower erected atop a cliff near the Azinhaga Valley, in the parish of Ferragudo. This 16th-century military structure was part of a watchtower that complemented the coastal defensive system of the Portuguese coastal territory, from Minho to Algarve, and its purpose was to alert the defensive forces on land, and the coastal populations, of the threats of Corsicans and pirates, or others hostiles that arrived by sea”.
