Find out why we enjoy working in Athens, a city that embraces contemporary design and architecture, buzzing bars and design-driven hotels, while the classics never go out of style. A tour through the eyes and offerings of some of our customers.
In the last few years, the capital of Greece offers high quality of life, embracing contemporary design, art and architecture, friendly people, buzzing nightlife and good food. Paradoxically, the best thing about working in Athens is that you can easily escape from it to beautiful seaside landscapes or snow-covered mountains, the nearest Greek island being only a 40-minutes boat-trip away. Despite problems such as traffic, parking, relatively high prices and lack of parks, overall it is a rewarding place to live and work. We will try to present our Athens to you, through the eyes and offerings of some of our customers.
For every visitor to Athens since antiquity, the main attraction has been the Parthenon, the city's centerpiece. Mark Twain saw it, by moonlight, as a pink loaf sugar, while Virginia Woolf declared (in Jacob's Room) that it «appears...likely to outlast the entire world».
The first archaeological site in the world to charge for entry, the Acropolis is still worth every cent. It will make even more of an impact when the scaffolding comes down in the end of 2010, after an ambitious restoration project that began in 1975. At the top of the Acropolis citadel, After a sweaty hike up marble steps smoothed by centuries of sightseers, the first monument to see in the Acropolis citadel is Propylaea, Greek word for entrance. Walking through Propylaea one is faced by the Nikis Temple, Erechtheio and the Parthenon. Huddled below the Acropolis, are the Dionyssus and Herodion theatres, the ancient Agora and the tiled neo-classical roofs of 19th century Plaka. Beyond, modern Athens stretches as far as the sea and the mountains surrounding Athens, confirming what travel writer Christopher Wordsworth noted wryly back in 1836, «The least ruined objects here are some of the Ruins themselves.»
Yet modern Athens has more to offer than ancient glories. After a fast-track spruce-up for the 2004 Olympics, the city has developed a taste for contemporary art and architecture. Adding up to a record number of theatres, the Athens Festival, under new management, has broken out of its classical confines to embrace world music, directional theatre and contemporary dance in a dozen venues from ancient amphitheatres to disused factories. The Hellenic Literature and History Archive (ELIA) has taken premise in a set of neo-classical building in Plaka and the Greek Film Archive, digitized by Steficon in 2008, has moved into new premises in the upwardly mobile neighborhood of Metaxourgio. The National Theatre (with its glorious ceiling paintings) and the Byzantine and Christian Museum (with an uncharacteristically irreverent exhibition of Andy Warhol's Icons) both reopened recently after some extensive renovations. The National Gallery can be visited on line at www.nationalgallery.gr.
None of these projects was as hotly anticipated as the €130m new Acropolis Museum, which finally opened last summer after 33 years of false starts and law suits. Erecting an unapologetically modern monument just 300m from the most influential building in Western civilization was always going to be controversial. «You have to be both very arrogant and very humble,» says the architect, Bernard Tschumi, who also designed Paris' Parc de la Villette.
Admitedly, humility is not the most obvious feature of Tschumi's colossal glass, concrete and marble structure. Inside, however, the sober galleries allow the antiquities to sing. All 4.000 artifacts were found on or around the Acropolis; many of them have never been exhibited before.
Giddying glass floors reveal an ancient settlement unearthed during construction, which will open to the public later this year. A ramp leads to the soaring Archaic Gallery, where statues are artfully arranged among giant columns – a kore smiles enigmatically at a buff kouros, and a sinewy hunting dog pounces on its prey. The top-floor gallery – a glass box aligned with the temple overhead – contains the piéce de résistance: the 160m Parthenon frieze. Crude plaster casts stand in for the sections removed by Lord Elgin between 1801 and 1805 and now on display in the British Museum.
Controversial was the local authorities' attempt to demolish two listed buildings to improve the view from the museum's restaurant. One belongs to the reclusive composer Vangelis of 'Charriots of Fire' fame. The other is an art deco masterpiece. After a long legal battle, the High Court of Appeals recently repealed the government's decision to knock down the buildings on Dionysiou Areopagitou, the boulevard below the Acropolis that was pedestrianised in 2002 as part of an ambitious project (called 'Ενοποίηση Αρχαιολογικών Χώρων') to link the city's ancient landmarks with a 10-mile promenade.
«All the architects on this street respected the scale of the monuments and each other's works. In Athens, it's very rare to get so many beautiful buildings side by side,» says resident Aristos Doxiadis. An online architectural magazine has put forward various proposals to redesign the back of the buildings. Although much of Athens is self-consciously modern, the classics never go out of style. Shabby Theklas Street (where Lord Byron fell for «The Maid of Athens», 12-year-old Teresa Makri) is home to Pantelis Melissinos, whose leather sandals are named after his celebrity clients – Jackie O, John Lennon, and others. The more philosophically inclined can follow in the fashion footsteps of Socrates or Plato. Melissinos's sister, Olgianna, runs a less commercial sandal emporium on nearby Normanou Street. Next door is The Art Foundation, a gallery with a hidden courtyard that becomes a buzzing bar after dark.
Bars are big business in Athens, a city that doesn't really get going until after midnight. Even the old red light district, Kerameikos, is now peppered with buzzy bars such as Nixon, where pretty young things flirt beneath a vintage chandelier and next to an in-house cinema. Bare bulbs beckon less glamorous punters to the nearby bordellos. The squats and car workshops of neighboring Gazi have been crowded out by bars, restaurants and artists' lofts since a metro station opened in 2007. Once the hub of the gay scene, these days Gazi attracts all kinds of nighthawks. Mediterranean restaurant Canteen (or its in-house bar Swing) is currently the place to be seen. The architects, Andreas kourkoulas and Maria Kokkinou, also created the Benaki Museum on Pireos Avenue, an eye-catching showcase for architecture and design exhibitions. The gift shop is a good place to pick up art books and original pieces by local potters and jewellers. The same architects made their mark at Scala Vinoteca, where you can sample Greek vintages from the wall of wine bottles and mezzes by top chef Christoforos Peskias.
The glossy crowd reflects the location in uptown Syntagma and Kolonaki neighpourhoods. Bypass Gucci and Prada and head to the Attica Department Store, occupying a whole block of shops, theatres and cafes. At Papadakis, power brokers devour octopus stewed in honey and wine, sea urchin salad, and deep-fried baby shrimp. The bougatsa – syrupy filo oozing warm custard – is irresistible. If you can’t get a table, try the burgers at the Periscope hotel’s cocktail bar, which opened in October.
Apart from the legendary hotels Grande Bretagne and King George Palace, as much of a landmark as the Parliament building across the street, Athens had a dearth of stylish lodgings until Classical Hotels and art-collector Dakis Joannou gave Athens design-driven hotels such as the Baby Grand, Fashion House and Periscope. Joannou's Yes! Hotels are as much a showcase for his modern art collection as for contemporary designers such as Rashid (who created the Day-Glo Semiramis) and Fernando and Humberto Campana (who will bring ecochic to the Yes! Athens hotel, opening in late 2010, with a vertical garden by Patrick Blanc).
The next star architect to hit town is Renzo Piano, who has been commissioned by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation to create a €450m cultural park in the seaside suburb of Faliron. Opening in 2015, it will include an Opera House, National Library, and open-air concert hall.
A revival of the city's 50km coastline, recently known as the Athens Riviera, is already under way. Since Starwood took over the waterfront Astir Palace resort, it has renovated the beach bungalows, upgraded the Arion Spa, and opened the Matsuhisa Athens restaurant, designed by David Rockwell – the sushi at other Nobu restaurants may be better, but only the Cape Town branch can compete with its sensational seaside setting. It's a perfect spot for a passion fruit martini as yachts drift off into the sunset. For a more low-key dinner with equally sensational views, head across the bay to cozy Akti, where you can feast on deep-fried calamari and grilled red mullet in refreshingly authentic surroundings. The masterpiece of the Riviera, Cape Sounion, lies less than an hour away from the centre of Athens, after a pleasant seaside drive. A unique place to stay there is the Cape Sounion hotel.
Our office is located in the conveniently-located Neo Psychiko region of Athens, opposite the posh residential region of Psychiko. Landmarks of the area are the Patron café and restaurant (ex Deals) , the Ramba wine bar, while 'Taverna', just beneath our office, offers Greek food combining a designer environment with low prices.
Athens may be changing fast, but there are still pockets where time stands still. In Anafiotika, a miniature Cycladic island marooned below the Acropolis, cats snooze under cascades of bougainvillea. With tiny tables tumbling down the stairway, Yiasemi is an adorable bistro where you can linger for hours with an ouzo and a succession of home-cooked mezze. At outdoor cinemas, chain-smoking Greeks blithely gossip on their mobile phones while Audrey Hepburn takes a Roman holiday beneath a canopy of stars. (Athenians have brushed off the July 1 smoking ban with their usual anti-authoritarian insouciance.) In Ano Petralona, a neighbourhood famous for its dirt-cheap tavernas, customers peer into pots of braised goat and lamb fricassee at Economou's taverna.
To sample modern Greek food (and some of the country's finest wines, currently enjoying a renaissance), head to Cucina Povera. Sommelier Yannis Kaimenakis, who launched his career at the now defunct 48, has teamed up with chef Kleomenis Zournatzis, whose menu changes daily. If you're lucky, it will include fried cherries and lamb shank in beer and coriander sauce.
Despite the fact that Athenians work hard and long hours, coffees and meals of shared mezze (mezedakia) sometimes go on forever. On a Saturday or Sunday, lunch can easily slide into supper. Athenians have their own word for bons viveurs – kaloperasakides and kolovares – which loosely translates as «good timers» and «lazy bastards». Dilys Powell put her finger on it in her mid-century memoir, An Affair of the Heart: «I still thought of Athens as a place of sun, friendly, elegant, cosmopolitan; a place of chattering cafés, smart parties, and sophisticated arguments; a place to sit on a summer evening amidst the murmur of crowds and the glimmer of bright dresses...».
