A VILLAGE REMEMBERED
Behind Freedom Ville is the story of an abandoned village coming back to life.
And of a woman and her family leaving Amsterdam city life behind — their home, their hospitality projects and the life they knew — and moving to a forgotten village in rural Portugal.
In search of something simpler. Something more real.
You’ve seen what grows above the ground. Now meet the roots.
In search of deeper connection.
In search of freedom.
What followed became much more than the restoration of a village.
It became a journey of transformation.
Somehow, the project and the people shaping it began to mirror one another. As old walls were opened, stripped back and rebuilt, life seemed to invite a similar process — peeling away layers of constructed identity, inherited ideas and familiar ways of living.
Making space for something underneath.
Less constructed. More rooted.
And beneath it all...
quite literally, was the land.
Wild, demanding, generous — and completely uninterested in who anyone thought they were supposed to be.
The land had lessons waiting. So did the village. So did living and working together.
Some beautiful. Some brutal. Most still unfolding.
Freedom Ville became more than a project. It became a practice ground for exploring how we want to live, what we want home to feel like, what kind of culture we want to shape — and how we can take care of nature so that nature can continue taking care of us.
We don't have all the answers.
But we are living the questions.
VISION
Long before cities grew, nations were formed and borders were drawn, there was the village.
The root of society.
A place where life was shared. Where people needed each other. Where children grew up surrounded by more than their parents. Where culture, shared values and responsibility helped shape how people lived together.
We believe the village still holds something we have forgotten to remember.
Practise the world you want to live in.
Build the village you want your children to grow up in.
Shape the culture you want to pass on.
And perhaps nature holds part of the key.
Away from the noise, speed and endless distractions of modern life, something becomes quieter. We begin to listen again. To the land. To each other. To ourselves. To a deeper knowing that perhaps was never lost — only buried underneath everything else.
Not to go backwards in time.
But to root ourselves deeply enough to move forward.
To strip away some of the noise and reconnect with the roots of our existence. To remember what makes us human. What makes us feel alive. What gives our lives meaning.
To remember that we belong.
To each other.
To the Earth.
To something greater than ourselves.
And from those roots, we create.
Because we don't want to give all our attention to what is breaking.
We want to remember the creative power we still hold.
The power to choose. To build. To grow. To care. To collaborate. To shape culture. To regenerate a piece of land, a relationship, a community — and ourselves along with it.
Not by denying the destruction around us.
But by refusing to let destruction become the only story we know how to tell.
Freedom Ville is our place to practise another one.
One choice. One relationship. One piece of land at a time.
Root deeply. Live consciously. Create courageously.
And perhaps, together, remember what we already know.
Root deeply. Live consciously. Create courageously.
MALHADIL
Before Freedom Ville, there was Malhadil.
The old name of the village carries something beautifully fitting for what this place is becoming: cultivated land held within the wild — a small human settlement rooted in the nature surrounding it.
Malhadil is the place beneath the project. The land, the stone, the history that was here long before us.
Freedom Ville is the name we gave to what we are practising here.
A search for freedom that, over time, has become less about escaping something and more about consciously choosing what we want to create.
OUR VALUES
Three values keep bringing us back to our roots. Not rules. Not statements for the wall. A compass.
connection
Everything begins with connection.
Connection to ourselves, so we can hear what is true beneath the noise.
Connection to each other, because we need one another to love, learn, grow, discover our blind spots and experience belonging.
Connection to the land — not as something outside of us, but as the living system we are part of. The earth that feeds us, shelters us, carries us and teaches us.
And connection to something greater than ourselves — God, spirit, life, the universe, whatever name feels true. The place where control can soften into trust, receiving and surrender.
Connection reminds us:
There is no real separation.
We are nature. We belong to each other.
consciousnes
What we can see, we can choose.
Consciousness is the willingness to look beneath our conditioning. To question the stories, patterns, systems and identities we inherited instead of unconsciously repeating them.
It is understanding that nothing exists in isolation.
How we think influences how we act. How we act shapes our relationships. Our relationships shape culture. And culture shapes the world we live in.
Consciousness gives us the possibility to choose again.
courage
Knowing is one thing. Living it asks for courage.
The courage to act on what we know. To speak honestly. To change direction. To let go. To begin again. To make choices that may not be the easiest or most familiar ones.
Because freedom is not the absence of responsibility.
Freedom is choice.
And with every choice comes the responsibility for what we create from it.
Connection shows us what matters.
Consciousness allows us to see.
Courage allows us to choose.
And from there, so many of the other values we speak about naturally follow: responsibility, reciprocity, contribution, creativity, regeneration and care for the natural world.
Not separate values. Different expressions of the same roots.