I spoke with Filipe Cuiça, the founder of Bound, a homemade cookie shop in Faro. I discovered him at the Artist and Fleas market and bought a cookie, which was delicious. That’s why I decided to approach Filipe to learn more about his brand.

A late-night cookie experiment

As he explains, he got into baking by complete accident. One night, he was at home scrolling through his phone when he came across a famous New York bakery known for its massive cookies. “I remember thinking, I wish I could try one of those. But there was nothing even close to that style where I lived — maybe not even in Portugal at the time.”

That same night, out of pure curiosity, Filipe searched for recipes online. He had zero baking or cooking experience, but went to the supermarket, grabbed the ingredients, and decided to give it a try. He baked his first batch late at night, and suddenly the whole house was filled with the smell of warm cookies. “When I tasted the first one, I was honestly shocked at how good it was — especially considering it was my first attempt.”


This experience immediately led to an obsession. Filipe kept baking batch after batch, tweaking something small each time, trying to make them better. His girlfriend, Ana, also fell in love with cookies, and since the two couldn’t eat all their baking experiments, Ana decided to take some to the hospital where she works.

By lunchtime, there wasn’t a single cookie left. Her colleagues were asking for more and even wanted the recipe, which she jokingly said was a secret.

From then on, Ana’s colleagues became their unofficial taste testers. “We’d bake new batches, Ana would take them to the hospital, and we’d get feedback. That’s when it clicked for me: maybe these cookies are good enough to sell.”

When cookies become a business

After those first experiments, Filipe knew he wanted to turn this into something bigger. He always had a dream of opening a shop, but it wasn’t possible straight away. So, for the first two years, everything happened in their tiny home kitchen. “Both Ana and I had full-time day jobs, so we would bake late at night, batch after batch, and then I’d spend the next day delivering cookies to anyone who messaged us on Instagram.”

On weekends, they took cookies to local markets across the Algarve. Those markets were essential — not just for sales, but for building the brand, connecting with people, and understanding what customers loved.

Turning a dream into reality

Every euro they made went straight back into the business — buying better tools for the little kitchen, improving ingredients, and slowly building the brand they dreamed of.

It went like this for two years, until they finally had the conditions to open a store. “From the start, we imagined a small, minimalist place focused purely on making the best cookies possible. The plan was originally to be take-away only, but we ended up adding one table and a few chairs — just enough for people to sit, enjoy their cookies, and feel at home.”

Opening the store wasn’t easy. Filipe and Ana faced many unexpected problems — hidden costs they didn’t anticipate and many others — but eventually they found a place that fit their vision.

Now they have a kitchen, designed specifically for baking cookies. “It’s still small, but more than enough, and it feels like a huge upgrade compared to baking at home.”

The cookie philosophy

Even after all this time, Filipe still has the same goal: to make the best cookies they possibly can. “We use the best ingredients we can find and are trying to perfect our cookies. Everything is made in-house, by hand, in our kitchen. Instead of using chocolate chips, we cut real chocolate bars into big chunks — it completely changes the texture and flavour.”

Ingredients are important, and according to Filipe, there’s one ingredient essential for a perfect cookie: nuts. They add a crunchy texture that balances the dough's softness, making every bite more interesting. That’s why Filipe’s personal favourite cookie is still the classic — the very first one made. It has milk chocolate, dark chocolate, and walnuts. The balance of flavours is perfect, and after all these years, it’s still the one he always goes back to.

Building the brand

As the business grew, Filipe began to understand how important branding and customer experience really are. From the beginning, the aim was to build more than just a product — to build a brand people could connect with, recognise, and come back to. “Branding is something I genuinely enjoy, and it plays a big role in making Bound feel like a place with personality, not just another bakery.”

Choosing Faro as the shop's location was an easy decision. Faro is full of students and tourists, and that mix of locals and visitors was perfect for opening a new cookie shop. It’s also a town where they started to sell cookies at the markets, so they had people who knew them and followed the cookies from the beginning.

Cookies travelling across Europe

Over time, they have received many customer reactions, but one of the funniest and most memorable is when they received pictures of their cookies from other countries. “We got a message with one of our cookies in London, Paris, or Amsterdam. It’s always incredible to see how far something we made in our tiny kitchen can travel.”

Filipe adds, “Through all of this, living in the Algarve has been a huge part of our story. The weather, the light, the slower pace, and the fact that you can go to the beach almost all year round — it’s a special place to live and an even better place to build something from scratch.”