If you are walking around the ancient neighborhood of Plaka you might find yourself lucky enough to be face to face with these doors on a 1960s apartment building. While most of the homes in Plaka are 19th century and early 20th century neoclassical there are some that snuck in the later years of the century. This whimsical set of doors were created by Panos Valsamakis. They represent a point in time when Greek artists where commissioned to create beautiful details for new buildings. We see this all over Athens in the lobbies of both commercial and residential buildings. Somewhere along the way architects stopped designing buildings and developers took over and these lovely details were unfortunately value engineered out of the equation.

You can also see some of Valsamakis' beautiful ceramic tiles in the lobby of the Astor Hotel near Syntagma Square at the corner of Voulis and K. Servias Streets.

And you can still visit the Valsamakis workshop in Athens and see all that they have been producing since 1960.

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https://valsamakisceramics.com/

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