The holiday Classic: Hand-Blown Seasonal Glass Ornaments

Fire Glass Art, a small neighborhood workshop in Thessaloniki, has been making beautiful hand-blown glass holiday ornaments since 1974. Working alongside her mother Anastasia, Athanasia Kotopoulou is the third generation of the family to carry on the craft. Each piece is hand painted and the range spans from vintage glass ornaments made by her father Dimitrios to her own whimsical designs: emojis, minions, and even a “science” series decorated with equations and symbols. Greek-themed ornaments are playful and beautiful: the Blue Eyes are naturally a hit and come in several sizes and colors. There are also white Cycladic churches on blue backgrounds, anchors, donkeys, and even an ornament with a “tsarouchi.” 

A Piece of Greek Summer 

Fine artist Nefeli Kyriacou, a graduate of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki’s School of Fine Arts, also holds degrees in archaeology and art history. She works in various media, including painting, street art, printmaking, and digital art, and much of her work focuses on the intimate environments of everyday life. Her summer scarf, with its eclectic fan, ice-cream pop, crumpled soda can, and iconic white plastic chair, is a playful and sentimental depiction of innocence and nostalgia.

Showing the Greek Seas Some Love

Bluecycle, an innovative team working out of a lab in Piraeus, repurposes marine waste from fishing and shipping activities. Plastic waste is recycled into 3D printing filament and then transformed into stylish and unique objects, such as this wavy seashell plate.

On Loving Athens

You couldn’t wish for a more engaging guide to the Greek capital than Nikos Vatopoulos, a journalist with the soul of a poet. By no means a traditional guidebook, “Walking in Athens” (Metaixmio, 2018), his collection of beautifully observed, sensitive vignettes – originally published in the Sunday edition of Kathimerini – evokes the moods of the city, with plenty of stories along the way. It is essential reading for anyone who loves Athens or dreams of her from afar.

Nothing evokes the Athenian experience more movingly than walking along the stone paths around the Acropolis. They appear so ideally suited to their historic and natural setting that it seems they have been there forever. This graceful large-scale work, however, was conceived by the famous Greek architect Dimitris Pikionis, known for his explorations of critical regionalism, for his collaboration with traditional craftsmen, and for incorporating pieces of the city itself as it underwent the transition to modernity. In “The Magical Path to the Acropolis” (Melissa, 2016) author Nick Papandreou tells its story, with an introduction by architect Dimitris Philippides, professor at the National Technical University of Athens.

Learn to Strategize Like Alexander the Great

The ancient Greeks sharpened their minds with petteia, a strategy game esteemed that Plato is said to have likened mastering petteia to mastering mathematics and geometry. Achilles, Ajax and Alexander played it, and now so can you. Seikilo, the Museum of Ancient Music founded by the Koumatzis family in Thessaloniki, makes ancient games (€15-50) in addition to crafting beautiful traditional musical instruments (starting at €540), each a work of art. You can also book a guided experience that concludes with a hands-on experience of the ancient Lyra.

Art and the City

In recent years, there has been a gratifying surge of international interest in the polykatoikia, the iconic urban Greek apartment building that is as much cultural phenomenon as architectural type. The Athenian architect and illustrator behind Birds & Lofts, Myrsini Maneta, finds inspiration in her home city: its history, its architecture, and the stories of its people. The polykatoikia stars in some of her works, all of which capture a strong sense of place with a whimsical eye for detail. She also has prints featuring favorite neighborhoods of Athens, both famous ones and those more locally known and loved like Pangrati, Exarchia, and Kypseli. 

Café Classic

How do Greek waiters navigate a crowded café, swinging and tilting a tray full of drinks without spilling a drop? With these ingenious, lightweight aluminum swinging trays, handmade in Greece. It’s like a carnival ride for your negroni and it adds a casual note to your home entertaining. You can get one from Dimtsas, a third-generation Greek company specializing in professional kitchen supplies. Several sizes and colors are available.

Always Summer

Greek Summer is a welcome theme whatever the time of year, and painter-designer Christina Mandilari captures the moment beautifully. With a nostalgic palette and an appealingly playful line, Naked Summers looks at the relationship between nature and lovers through mosaic paintings, hand-painted ceramics, accessories, and items for the home, with imagery that is unmistakably and evocatively Greek. Pieces are available online or at her charming atelier in Neapoli/Exarchia. “The Kiss” platter is a classic choice; the mosaic painting “The Huntress” is a standout statement piece.

For Sustainability-Minded Cinephiles

3Quarters has put sustainability and circularity at the forefront of their creative process since opening in 2015, making chic, durable bags from materials like awning fabric that would otherwise go to waste. This limited series of totes, each entirely unique, makes use of repurposed cinema banners.

A Trench With a Twist

A metal cafe table, a lemon, laundry drying in the sun, an antenna, a simple wooden chair – the print of the Dorothea coat is like a playful and charming shorthand for the Greek townscape. Add the unique looming technique, the fact that it’s made of excellent 100% Greek cotton, and the brand’s firm commitment to sustainability, and you have a great feel-good Greek gift that’s also a lasting piece of art. 

The Sweetest Taste of Greece

From the wisdom of bees, the sweetness of nature is distilled with all its personality intact. Greek bees make honey from all kinds of sources – trees, herbs, flowers – each with its distinctive taste. This taster pack of small bottles of honey from hives across Greece will make a charming conversation piece over breakfast or interactive dinner-party finale (chestnut honey in particular pairs nicely with cheese).