Covilhã is known for its ancient history and heritage linked to wool crafts, with no particular vocation for the art of ceramics. The allusions known regarding ceramics and clay are implicit in various references throughout its history, presuming the existence of manifestations related to such activity.

In the transcription of the Tombo da Comarca da Beira – a document produced during the verification and condition of the properties in the reign of King João I (1395) – Braamcamp Freire (1914) refers to a ground called “old pottery” and a “pottery path” in the vicinity of the Church of Santo André, which location is still undetermined.

It is expected that, over the centuries, pottery activity will persist and give way to the emergence of other and new pottery. However, it was not possible to identify the sources of this occurrence. The fact is that, at first glance, the city and some of the parishes in the municipality present evidence of the use of ceramic elements in their constructions, the most evident being those inherent to factory buildings (18th-20th centuries), either in the oldest urban core or in the vicinity of the Carpinteira and Goldra streams, where some of the colossal brick masonry chimneys tearing up the landscape still remain.

The growing economic power of the bourgeoisie related to the textile industry made regular trips to Europe possible during the 19th and 20th centuries. These trips were, in some way, responsible for the later profusion in Portugal – and, specifically, in Covilh – of elements that revealed clear influences from one of the most expressive European artistic movements of the time – Art Nouveau.

Between the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, Covilhã witnessed a peak in artistic elements inspired by Art Nouveau, in which the use of ceramics, in particular decorative tiles, acquired a preponderance in construction in the city and other parishes in the municipality, particularly in Tortosendo. We find them, for example, at Palacete Jardim, at Colégio Moderno, at Club União, in the current branch of Banco Comercial Português, in the former Empresa Transformadora de Lãs, currently the UBI Engineering Centre, in Colégio das Freiras building, and in one of the mansions at the entrance of Tortosendo.

Despite having exterior elements that reveal a more practical than artistic concern regarding the application of ceramics (specifically tiles), a special concern with hygiene in the façades and interiors of buildings is notorious, which favors materials and architectural resources of greater quality, healthiness, and durability. Thus, in addition to decorative tiles, it is possible to verify the existence of buildings covered with ceramic mosaics and national or imported tiles without any reference to local production, namely in Covilhã.

In Covilha, Palacete Jardim, near Jardim Público (Av. Frei Heitor Pinto), is the most prominent in terms of the use of decorative tiles inspired by Art Nouveau, both in the exterior and interior. Designed by Ernesto Korrodi (1915), property was the residence of Joseph Bouhon’s family. The ceramic elements that cover the exterior came from Belgium and represent naturalistic elements and female figures, bucolic and rural landscapes, and ornaments with fruits, flowers, and birds, among various floral motifs.

Located on Visconde da Coriscada Street, the building that currently houses the Banco Comercial Português branch has a façade topped with a panel of tiles with plant motifs, and the central body is decorated with garlands and festoons, where the influence of the Art Nouveau movement is evident.

On the walkway of S. Silvestre, we find a residential building, with a plan designed by Januário Martins d’Almeida, which has a façade covered with decorative blue and white geometric pattern tiles.

One may find a residential building with Art Nouveau elements on Cristóvão de Castro Street, in which the facade presents tiles with images referring to the city and Serra da Estrela, painted in blue and framed by polychrome phytomorphic and geometric motifs.

The building known as Colégio das Freiras, commissioned by Comendador José Maria Campos Melo, presents Art Nouveau characteristics and, of the ceramic details, the ledge band with voluptuous ceramic elements stands out.

On Beato Francisco Álvares Street, we find a residential building that currently houses the restaurant Açafrão, featuring Art Nouveau-inspired tile panels with floral motifs composed of finials, garlands, and poppies with intertwined stems. Another building with a panel made of polychrome tiles with floral motifs is located on Cavaleiros Street, where Colégio Moderno is located.

Club União, formerly the residence of Júlio Henriques da Cruz, is covered in brown monochromatic rectangular tiles, just like the building on Conselheiro Santos Viegas Street, (commissioned by Priest Alfredo dos Santos Marques) and a building located on Marquês de Pombal Street, designed by Januário Martins d’Almeida, featuring a white and green tiles façade.

On the walkway, Fonte do Lameiro, where the UBI Engineering Centre currently operates, stands for the former building of the Empresa Transformadora de Lãs, which operated here until its closure. The building, designed by Ernesto Korrodi, has part of its façade decorated with polychrome tiles, forming scrolls, embedded with floral and vegetal motifs formed by flowers and acanthus flanking a female figure spinning and at the top the designation of that factory unit. The same motifs inherent to the wool industry in polychrome tiles can be seen inside the building.

In addition to the masonry chimneys made of ceramic tiles and tiles found in buildings with Art Nouveau elements, it is essential to mention that Covilhã also has an enormous religious heritage, which also includes decorative ceramic applications in the interior and exterior, such as the Chapel of S. Silvestre, which has a panel of Spanish-Moorish tiles on its interior front wall. Among all the religious heritage sites, the Church of Santa Maria Maior is undoubtedly the object that stands out the most in terms of the use of ceramics, both for its monumentality and for its facade, covered with tiles with motifs of the cult of the Virgin Mary, made by Fábrica Aleluia in 1943.

In some streets of Covilhã, the street’s designations are presented in multicolored tiles made at the Fábrica de Cerâmica Constança, designed by Leopoldo Battistini, a painter and ceramist of Italian origin who settled in Portugal, where he worked as a technical education teacher in Lisbon and Coimbra. These toponymic plaques, still in their respective locations, refer to dates, personalities and institutions that played an important role in the political, religious, scientific, social and cultural life of the city, namely: Cristóvão de Castro, António Pedroso dos Santos, Ruy Faleiro, Bombeiros Voluntários, Pero da Covilhã, Comendador Mendes Veiga, Heitor Pinto, S. Francisco Alvares, 1st December Street, António Plácido da Costa, Sebastião S. Júlio and Constable Nun’Alvares Pereira. There are also others that were dismantled and are part of the collection of the Municipality of Covilhã, namely those of António Augusto Aguiar, Visconde da Coriscada, and Marquês d’Ávila e Bolama.

Covilhã was the birthplace of one of the first artists to work in the Fábrica de Porcelana da Vista Alegre as a ceramist, modeler, and designer. We are talking about the sculptor, painter, goldsmith, engraver, and medallist Manuel Morais da Silva Ramos, better known as Morais do Convento.

Morais do Convento was born in Covilhã on January 1, 1806. At the age of 15, he was admitted to the Real Casa Pia in Lisbon, where he attended a public drawing class and became an assistant. The founder of the Fábrica de Porcelana Vista Alegre and the administrator of the Casa Pia, José Ferreira Pinto Basto, invited Manuela Morais da Silva Ramos to work there as a modeler, sculptor, and painter because of his high level of craftsmanship and aesthetic insight. Some of his works can still be found in the Vista Alegre Museum in Ílhavo.

This artist is referred to in works such as A História da Gravura Artística de Portugal, the Livro do Centenário da Vista Alegre and Porcelana Artística Portuguesa.