Picture stone walls draped in ivy, arches opening onto the sky, and nothing else between you and the stars. The Ruinas Historicas do Nuncio aren’t a palace or a ballroom — they’re exactly what the name says: ruins, in the open air, in the middle of the Sintra-Cascais Natural Park, turned into one of the most poetic wedding settings in Portugal.
It’s a blank canvas, raw and full of soul — for couples who don’t want gilt and chandeliers, but stone, greenery, and natural light. Candlelit dinners under the sky, symbolic ceremonies among ancient arches, parties that breathe forest.
For couples who want an open-air, alternative, deeply romantic wedding, this is the spot. If you ask us, it’s the venue with the most personality in the whole range.
The space is open-air, with no accommodation on-site, but the Penha Longa Resort is nearby. Mary Me coordinates room blocks there and at the Sintra hotels and handles transfers, so guests sleep close and reach the ruins easily.
The ruins give the space its name: stone structures worn by time and reclaimed by ivy, deliberately left in their romantic state rather than restored. It’s that imperfection that makes them magical — every half-fallen wall is a setting, every opening a frame.
The space is part of the events portfolio of Penha Longa Catering, the same operation that runs the Penha Longa Monastery and the Palacio da Fonte Nova, which guarantees a kitchen and a service to match, within the Sintra-Cascais Natural Park.
If you ask us, there are venues that try to look old and venues that are genuinely timeless. The Nuncio is, without doubt, the second kind.
We’re inside the Sintra-Cascais Natural Park, near the Linho and Penha Longa area — surrounded by forest, cut off from the world, yet a few minutes from Sintra and from Cascais. It’s a green, private enclave, made for celebrations that want nature for real.
The advantage for a destination wedding is silence with access: Lisbon airport is about thirty minutes away, and the Penha Longa Resort, nearby, solves the guests’ accommodation.
Anything the guests might want to do — the palaces of Sintra, a day in Lisbon, an escape to the beach — is at hand. Arriving is easy. Leaving — we can’t quite guarantee that part.
The Nuncio is, by nature, an open-air wedding — and that’s where all its beauty lies. The symbolic ceremony takes place among the stone arches and the ivy, with the sunset for lighting; the cocktail and dinner spread across the grounds, by candlelight and lanterns, under the stars. It hosts up to three hundred guests on a full-buyout basis.
Being a blank canvas, the Nuncio offers a creative freedom that formal spaces don’t allow — long tables among the ruins, floral installations in the openings, a dance floor under the open sky. Catering is by Penha Longa Catering, ensuring kitchen and service of standard.
It’s a venue that favours atmosphere and personality over formality — ideal for couples who dream of something memorable and off the conventional path, with a covered plan B in case the weather turns. And this is exactly where our experience comes in. The couple’s session moves among the ivy-covered stone ruins and the forest of the Sintra-Cascais Natural Park. Pop the question. We handle the rest.
A raw, open-air space like this is exactly where a planner’s coordination counts most, because everything that comes ready-made in a ballroom has to be designed and brought in from scratch here. We handle the full design of the space — lighting, tables, rain plan, guest comfort in the open air — in coordination with Penha Longa Catering, and we manage the accommodation at the Penha Longa Resort and the Sintra hotels, with transfers from Lisbon airport, thirty minutes away. And there’s the practical side: the civil-ceremony paperwork in Portuguese, the sound permits within the Natural Park, and a programme of palaces, Lisbon, and beaches for the guests. From the first call to the last dance.
It’s an open-air event space — ivy-covered stone walls and ancient arches, left in their romantic state, in the middle of the Sintra-Cascais Natural Park. It isn’t a palace or a ballroom: it’s a blank canvas for open-air weddings.
Up to around three hundred guests, on a full-buyout basis. The exact capacity for your format is confirmed with the venue’s operation.
Being an open-air venue, a covered plan B is essential — a marquee or alternative space. Mary Me always designs the rain plan and ensures guest comfort in any scenario.
No — it’s an open-air space. But the Penha Longa Resort is nearby, and Mary Me coordinates the room blocks there and at the Sintra hotels, with transfers.
Penha Longa Catering, the same operation behind the Penha Longa Monastery and the Palácio da Fonte Nova, which guarantees kitchen and service of standard in a space with no fixed infrastructure.
From late spring to early autumn, for mild open-air nights — that’s when the dinners under the stars shine. For summer dates, we recommend booking in advance.
It’s an open-air blank canvas — ivy-covered stone ruins, in the Sintra-Cascais Natural Park, for alternative, deeply romantic weddings under the stars. Personality like no other venue in the range.
