Hidden City: Discover Athens’s Arcades

On a good looking cool spring morning with temperatures hovering round 21°C, I resolve to spend the day as a vacationer in my hometown. By the top of the two-hour tour, I’ll have realized that whereas we Athenians like to assert that we all know our metropolis inside and outside, we frequently overlook the small particulars that make it so charming. Our assembly level is exterior the historic Ariston pastry store, well-known for its cheese pies. Our information, Natasha Pappa, is wearing a salmon-colored sundress. She has a agency, enthusiastic, and nice voice. As our group gathers, I’m shocked to see that, along with myself, there are three different Greeks among the many vacationers.

Natasha, who publishes impartial metropolis guidebooks and the city journal Desired Landscapes, can be a graphic designer, as evidenced by the small, fashionable e-book she is holding. However largely, she is a superb information with intensive data of Athens. When she returned to Athens from the Netherlands, the place she had lived for just a few years, she began strolling across the metropolis “as a result of I needed to get to know the actual Athens. And I all the time discovered a way of peace in the town’s stoas (arcades; coated passageways that join massive parallel or intersecting streets). There, I found a time capsule of kinds, a metropolis inside the metropolis that felt extra genuine.” So she determined to map as most of the metropolis’s arcades as she might, and in 2015, she printed a minimalist guidebook with distinctive, finely designed road plans, charting 40 such passageways, revealing their secrets and techniques.

Hidden designs

Natasha factors out the indicators  above us initially of our tour. Trying up on the Stoa ton Emporon (Retailers’ Stoa) on Voulis Road, we see indicators that learn “Your neighborhood Delta,” “Propo,” “Assos,” and “Time for Cooper.” As childhood reminiscences come flooding again, Natasha explains that the indicators are a part of an set up created a number of years in the past by a workforce of designers. Sadly, regardless of this artistic intervention, it has didn’t revitalize the encompassing outlets.

“Within the arcades, time appears to face nonetheless,” she says.  I think about how fantastic it might be if these quaint areas might be become cafés or eating places; they’d come to life once more. “Look, cafés and eating places are all good and good, however they eclipse the opposite outlets,” counters Natasha. “Inevitably, arcades lose their authentic character even when these areas should not taken over by chain shops.”

We stroll by means of the streets round Syntagma Sq., passing by Stoa Bolani, house of Aristokratikon pastry store, well-known for its chocolate pastries and golden ribbons, and Gouma, an previous jewellery store with a marble facade and a hand-crafted gold doorknob. Natasha attracts our consideration to the facades of the arcade’s varied small outlets, which embrace printers, vintage outlets, and musical instrument outlets. The hand-painted indicators evoke emotions of nostalgia.

“You’ll have me questioning if there are arcades in Milan,” Francesko, an Italian vacationer, says, smiling. Natasha provides another expertise that’s off the crushed observe, which appeals to foreigners who should not solely excited about taking a double-decker bus from Syntagma Sq. to Piraeus or the seashores of the Athens Riviera. Guided excursions like these have grown in reputation as Athens has emerged as a vacationer vacation spot in its personal proper, somewhat than as a one-day stopover on the best way to the Cyclades.

Roots that attain the decrease floor flooring

Natasha factors out that there’s all the time a cool breeze blowing by means of the town’s arcades, providing pedestrians refuge on scorching summer season days. In earlier years, Natasha started her excursions earlier to keep away from the recent afternoon solar. The draughty arcades are superb for grabbing a cup of espresso, searching outlets, or exploring the decrease floor flooring. Seeing Athens’ middle by means of its alleys and passageways permits you to escape the scorching solar and get to know the hidden and unassuming points of the town’s life.

We stroll to Stoa Pesmazoglou and peek by means of the window of Nikos Xilouris’ file retailer, which has been open since 1978. Within the atrium, we see a tree’s trunk and leafy branches. On the decrease floor ground, we change into misplaced within the maze of corridors and encounter its roots. “The decrease you go, the extra issues you’ll uncover,” Natasha says. “The historical past of the town’s arcades stays unexplored, not like that of its neoclassical buildings, for instance, which intrigue us as a result of they take us again to a time after we thought we have been the middle of the world.”

From a distance, we discover a gap and catch a glimpse of the previous Nationwide Library of Greece on Panepistimiou Road from an angle that had by no means seen earlier than. We proceed on to Stoa Orfanidou, which connects Stadiou and Sofokleous Streets. The proprietor of an vintage store exchanges just a few phrases with Natasha. The store is full of distinctive objects: a ceramic statuette of the Virgin Mary, a Japanese figurine, silver ornamental eggs, necklaces, and classic posters. A 2000s-style “Welcome” sticker greets us as we enter. A couple of shops down, we go by a window show with informal garments. They are saying that is the place denims have been offered after they first arrived in Greece. The encompassing outlets are a collector’s paradise, with cash, stamps, and prints galore, and some doorways down, one may even have their future learn.

Athens, metropolis of contrasts

Our final cease? Stoa Anatoli. In a small nook, amongst printers’ outlets, is Desired Landscapes, Natasha’s pocket bookstore, the place you could find guidebooks and posters of Athens, is positioned in a small nook among the many printers’ outlets. “This metropolis was constructed by small companies, by craftspeople and merchants. After the COVID pandemic, there was a pattern for e-shops to change into tiny bodily shops like mine,” she says, exhibiting me that she doesn’t actually have a inventory room. Extra inventory is saved beneath a sofa. Her store stands out due to its vibrant purple colour. “You take a look at it and marvel if the distinction matches the arcade. I made a decision to do it as a result of the gadgets I promote are much like these discovered within the skilled printers’ outlets throughout from me.”

I say goodbye to Natasha and head to Skouleniou Road. I order a drink at a stylish café that serves brunch to well-dressed Athenians and sunburned vacationers. It’s a really totally different world. Inevitably, I take into consideration how numerous this metropolis is and, extra importantly, how vital it’s to protect the contrasts that outline it. 

To e-book a tour of Athens’ arcades, go to desired-landscapes.com