P O S T B O X E S   O F   P O R T U G A L

aTom-art  •   Slideshow  •   Poster  •  

When traveling through the countryside of Portugal, you ill see an enormous diversity in postboxes. A lot of them are in a sorry state of existence, but even then, most of them are still in use. The people don't seem to care where the postman has to put his cards and letters, why bother, most of it are bills anyway.
Creating cover from the rain seems to be the real problem. Apparently not all postboxes seem to fullfill this task by design. Sometimes extra cover is needed in the form of pieces of corrugated iron or just a plastic bag kept in place with some stones found on the roadside. Mounting the postbox is another task where people find a myriad of solutions.

But the real charm of it all is probably that in the less prosperous places in Portugal one is still inclined to use an object as long as it serves it's purpose. Even when some maintainance or repair is necessary. The "throw-away-culture" seems to have passed these houses, giving these postboxes their personal and unique appearance.
Click on a picture to see an enlargement. Or click slideshow to see them all.