The Elegant Group is built on 22 years of experience of the Stern family and their teams in Portugal, creating and managing high-quality assets in Portugal. We are the developers, owners and operators of the Martinhal brand of luxury family resorts and real estate.
The resort development in Martinhal Sagres established the group’s reputation as a leading developer in Portugal. The 5-star resort on a 415.000 sq m plot at the corner of the Algarve’s stunning coast includes 37 hotel rooms, 132 village houses, 50 townhouses and villas with unique designs and a range of high-quality leisure, sports and food and beverage facilities.
Between 2015 and 2016, they opened 3 other Martinhal hotels and resorts in the Algarve and greater Lisbon. Their latest opening of the world’s first city-centre luxury family hotel in Lisbon’s cultural quarter, Chiado is especially interesting as it is a truly unique property in the middle of Lisbon’s old town. In January 2023, after repeated approaches from a local family in Quinta da Marinha, the Sterns sold their hotel in Quinta da Marinha – MARTINHAL CASCAIS. In June 2023 they opened our 5th Martinhal (Martinhal Lisbon Oriente/ Martinhal Residences).
All four Martinhal hotels & resorts are based on private investors acquiring villas and apartments with the option to enter their property into the letting pool of the operator. Since its inception in 2010, Martinhal has had an excellent reputation with owners. The couple has become known for creating destinations that have global appeal. To date, they have sold over 300 Martinhal branded apartments and houses to individual expatriate buyers alone.
Savills has recently picked Martinhal as one of the top 3 branded residences brands in Europe. They have also invested and delivered in other real-estate classes in the Lisbon area such as the neighbouring Ageas headquarters to Martinhal Residences (completed in December 2021) and the United Lisbon International School, which opened in September 2020 and already has more than 630 students (as of September 2023) and still growing. In November 2022, the Sterns entered into a Joint Venture whereby the Dukes Education Group came in as equity partners into the United Lisbon International School. The Dukes group owns over 45 schools – mostly in London.
The couple have become known for creating destinations that have global appeal. To date they have achieved around 300 sales of apartments and houses to individual expatriate buyers alone.
Roman Stern, CEO, Owner, Founder of Elegant Group
Chitra Stern, CEO, Owner, Founder of Martinhal
Resorts and United Lisbon International School
www.martinhal.com
Roman and Chitra Stern are honoured to be working with Capinha Lopes Consulting on the Martinhal Residences project. With offices in Lisbon, Porto, New Delhi and Port Louis, architect Eduardo Capinha Lopes has carved out a reputation as one of Lisbon’s leading architects working across a mix of commercial, high-end residential and luxury hotel projects around the world.
The works of Hundertwasser in Vienna and Bosco Verticale by Stefano Boeri in Milan provided inspiration to incorporate natural elements in to the building’s façade. Keen to optimise Martinhal Residences’ position next Jardim do Cabeço das Rolas within the landmark mixed used development, the architect says of the project :
“I have worked hard to integrate nature into the project. I have designed a luxury hotel residence building with superb facilities to meet the needs of great urban living, with views across the Tagus River, as well as the iconic 17km Vasco da Gama Bridge – all with nature integrated into the façade.”
