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The journey of José Castelo Deschamps includes childhood on construction sites, selling his own motorcycle to start his first house, and creating a construction company that focuses on garages integrated with apartments in Florianópolis.
José Castelo Deschamps, founder of Beco Castelo, built a career that began on construction sites and reached high-standard projects in Greater Florianópolis, where the construction company has been operating for almost five decades.
At 70 years old, the entrepreneur is leading Park Haus, a system patented by the company and associated with three projects with an estimated investment of R$ 1.1 billion in the coming years, according to a publication by Exame magazine.
In the institutional presentation of Beco Castelo, Park Haus Cacupé appears as a launch in the Cacupé neighborhood, in Florianópolis, with a proposal of garages integrated with the apartments and access closer to the residents’ routine.
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José Castelo Deschamps started in construction at a young age
Before reaching the command of a construction company, Deschamps left the interior of Antônio Carlos, about 40 kilometers from Florianópolis, and began to divide his routine between work, study, and bus trips to visit his family in Biguaçu.
His first contact with construction occurred in Florianópolis, at the house of Osmar Nascimento, on Presidente Goulart Street, where he did small jobs during the day and studied at night at the São José Archdiocesan School.
“When I got there, I first went to work and then to study. It was the first house I worked on,” recalls Deschamps, describing the phase when the construction became a source of income, makeshift housing, and practical learning.
From daily interaction with workers, materials, and deadlines, a formation emerged built outside management manuals but directly linked to the decisions that would later mark his business activities in the Santa Catarina real estate sector.
Over the following years, Deschamps went through operational and administrative roles, gaining experience in purchasing materials, organizing teams, cost control, monitoring deadlines, and delivering properties to clients.
The first turning point came with a project in Itapema
The first most significant professional change happened when he was called to manage a construction project in Itapema, on the North Coast of Santa Catarina, a role that required overseeing the construction from the initial stages to the final delivery.
To accept the opportunity, Deschamps left his studies and took on greater responsibility, in exchange for a higher salary and a role that expanded his understanding of the complete routine of a construction project.
Before this stage, he had already worked as a storekeeper in residential buildings in the region of Avenida Hercílio Luz, in the Center of Florianópolis, where he followed projects that helped shape his technical experience.
He was also part of the beginning of the Ceisa Center, a commercial enterprise that would become an urban reference in the capital of Santa Catarina, still in the foundation phase, before moving on to other challenges in civil construction.
Sale of the motorcycle helped finance the first house
With the higher salary from the new professional phase, Deschamps bought a Honda 150cc motorcycle, which he called “Cinquentinha,” but the acquisition ended up being transformed into capital to start his own construction project.
In 1976, the entrepreneur sold the motorcycle to buy construction materials and build the first house in Biguaçu, a property that was initially supposed to serve as a home for him and his wife.
The construction, however, consumed the savings before it was completed, and the lack of money led Deschamps to sell the unfinished property, in a negotiation that would mark the beginning of his career as an independent builder.
“My savings and the little motorcycle started the house, but when it got halfway, the money ran out,” he states.
The buyer was Luiz Gonzaga da Silveira, and the sale turned a financial difficulty into resources for new constructions, creating a reinvestment logic that would accompany the entrepreneur in the following decades.
From that moment on, Deschamps began building houses for third parties as an individual, taking on stages that ranged from documentation at the city hall to financing at Caixa, as well as budgeting, hiring labor, and final delivery.
During this period, Graciano Paulo de Amorim was hired as the first employee in Deschamps’ business journey and, even retired, remains connected to Beco Castelo, which gathers around 200 collaborators and generates more than 300 indirect jobs.
Without having completed high school or attended college, the builder could not technically sign the projects, but he designed houses, presented proposals, calculated costs, and forwarded the formal part to responsible engineers.
Beco Castelo was born after a partnership in Biguaçu
On March 4, 1978, the date of his wedding, Deschamps sold the second house he had built, reinforcing the strategy of turning each completed project into capital to finance the next stage.
“The bride got married and became homeless,” jokes the businessman, recalling that the properties were already planned for sale, focusing on the gradual expansion of construction activity.
Still in 1978, a former boss invited him to join as a partner in Biguaçu Empreendimentos e Construções, known as Beco, a move that took his individual work to a business structure.
Five years later, in 1983, came the company’s first building, when the lot and project acquired by Deschamps gave rise to the Carlos Magno Building, with 24 units, in São José.
The partnership continued until 1993, the year Deschamps bought the partner’s share and promoted the merger with Castelo Construções, giving rise to Beco Castelo.
From this phase, the construction company began to specialize in residential buildings and test solutions related to the daily use of residents, such as storage spaces near garages.
In the Ouro Fino Building, in Estreito, Florianópolis, the proposal appeared as a small pantry on the ground floor, before the market popularized the term hobby box for this type of environment.
Park Haus bets on garages integrated with apartments
The latest project from Beco Castelo is Park Haus, presented by the company as a system of private garages integrated with apartments, with a proposal aimed at bringing the car closer to the domestic routine.
According to Exame, the system registered with INPI allows the resident to park the vehicle inside their own unit, through internal ramps and planned accesses per floor.
According to the construction company’s description, Park Haus was developed to allow direct access from the car to the apartment without a vehicle elevator, using internal ramps with independent upward and downward flows.
The origin of the idea is associated by Deschamps with the 2003 blackout in Florianópolis, when the lack of power for almost three days exposed accessibility difficulties in tall buildings.
For the businessman, the proposal brings the experience of living in an apartment closer to the logic of a house, without abandoning the verticalization of residential developments in valued urban areas.
“There are, so far, four concepts of housing: the house, the building, the horizontal condominiums, and the semi-detached houses. The fifth concept is Park Haus,” says the businessman.
Exame reported that the Cacupé development is expected to be launched in 2026, when data such as the number of units, built area, and unit values will be disclosed.
According to the magazine, the Park Haus, along with two other similar projects, represents an estimated investment of R$ 1.1 billion in the coming years.
Even with the scale of the new developments, Deschamps attributes the growth of the construction company to the participation of engineers, technicians, workers, collaborators, and partners who have been with the company over almost five decades.
“I had many good collaborators with me over time, no one does anything alone,” he states.
At 70 years old, the founder of Beco Castelo says he intends to continue working, maintaining in the real estate sector the same routine he started when he was still learning the first tasks on a construction site.
In a market pressured by innovation, cost, location, and practicality, to what extent can models like Park Haus change the way of living in large cities?
