Street Art of Lisbon

For the last few years, Eric has wanted to go to Spain and Portugal for reasons he can’t quite put his finger on. When deciding on our trips for this year, the prices for a week in Lisbon were so low that we decided that we would take care of at least one of those countries and maybe get some sun while doing it. Going into Lisbon, we had no idea about anything. We knew that we would be able to read most of the signs since it looked enough like Spanish. We weren’t sure if we would be able to understand Portuguese (spoiler: NO!), but we hoped that it would work out enough. And we knew that we had to see at least one castle, cause Europe.

Sure, Lisbon is known for its tiles.  There are tiles on the walls of buildings, tiles form the streets, tiles are for sale in almost every stall. So many colors, combinations, and designs all over.

Surprises Around Every Corner!

What we didn’t expect was all the street art that we encountered. It started with walking to the Metro station at the airport. The walls were covered with famous Portuguese artists, writers, and others. Seeing these exaggerated caricatures after being up for almost 24 hours straight was slightly surreal and just a taste of what we would see the rest of the week.

Some of the street art was based on Lisbon’s history like this mural that told the story of the founding of the city.

One of the best parts of the city’s street art is that it is all over! Our journey from our hotel to Sao Jorge Castle took us by anti-tourist and anti-Air BnB signs, fun grandmas, random fish, and more.

“There was real jubilation in the streets the first few weeks. It’s still known as the Revolution of the Carnations, and is famous for its civility.” – Robert S. Pastorino, Commercial Attaché, 1974-77

We didn’t find out until almost our last day that red carnations are incredibly important to Lisbon when we took an organized tour.

On the 25th of April in 1974, there was a mostly bloodless coup which overthrew the dictator. Our tour guide said that red carnations were being handed out to the people. Some of them were even put into the muzzles of the rifles of the soldiers. Today, April 25th is a national holiday known as Freedom Day.

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