About us
In Picinguaba, we have tried to create a different place, with a different approach to the luxury hotel business. A place permeated by a sense of quality, where the standard of service means not only the use of the best products available, but also that you get it with a genuine smile. A place where you feel as if you were at home or staying with friends with whom you have some common values, like the love of beautiful things, nature, a taste for good food, music, beautiful surroundings. There is a combination of ease, friendliness, open-mindedness and discretion. We have brought here the finest that Brazil has to offer, in cuisine, music, arts, etc. A stay in Picinguaba is an experience never forgotten, interconnected with the village, offered to our guests since 2002, so that staying here is always a very special time.
Year after year and also by tradition since the 1970's, Picinguaba has become a meeting place for like-minded people in the know. There is an interesting chemistry which brings together artists, musicians, businessmen or businesswomen who are nature lovers. All sorts of people meet here around a caipirinha and find that they have mutual friends in New York, Paris or London, which is maybe less of a coincidence than it seems.
The spirit of the place
Our ambition has been to create a very special environment, which has at the same time the comfort, service and quality that one would expect, but also the spirit and the simplicity of a very human place, where guests are people, not just consumers.
In hotel management more than anywhere, the business is its people, the staff who dedicates their time and mind to it, the guests who honour us with their presence and for whom the time spent here is very important: they often have stressful lives and have had a hard time getting away. Here they want to forget the everyday life, get back in touch with themselves, their partners, their families; rediscover nature, open themselves to the world.
We aim to provide them with the environment for this experience, which is made easier for us by the natural beauty of the place and by the Brazilian spirit. This is our aim and our raison d'être: the pleasure of creating, meeting people, work well-done, based on a set of values such as respecting the environment, fair trade, promoting the local community and the country's culture, encouraging the arts, and generally trying to achieve a sense of harmony.
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Emmanuel Rengade, founder and owner
Emmanuel graduated from business school in France, before realizing that following a traditional career path in Paris or London would not be enough to fulfill his desire for nature, space and new experiences. After quite a few years living close to the tropics, from California to Portugal, Bolivia and ultimately Brazil, most of this time as a project developer for a major American company, he decided to stop carrying his laptop around for good.
In 2000, he discovered the village of Picinguaba and decided to settle in this exceptional location and apply his experience and taste for the Brazilian culture. After a year of renovation, he opened the hotel and lived in Picinguaba for six years, time to form a strong local team. He is now part-time in Picinguaba, sharing his days between the office in Sao Paulo and an ongoing second hotel project, Fazenda Catucaba, to open soon together with an organic farm and eco-villas.
His wife, Filipa, is developing a brand of Brazilian beach clothes that will be hand-made by the local community and sold in the 2 hotels. Along with their two young boys, they live in São Paulo, with frequent travels to Europe.
Emmanuel is also a photographer and the author of most pictures on this website, together with New-York photographer Joseph Keller and German photographer Joern Blohm.