The Masterpiece Beneath Your Feet

Rocks, rocks everywhere.  The essence of Greece.  Towering rocks, sculpted stones, ancient and modern.  It’s easy, on the way up to the magnificence of the Acropolis, to keep your eyes peeled to the heights in front of you, marveling at the mass of the foundation and at the elegance of the chiseled buildings.  It’s easy to forget to pay attention to the masterpiece beneath your feet.

Before the onset of tourism, the paths up to the Acropolis were random ones, beaten dirt paths.  In the mid 1950’s, Constantine Karamanlis, then the Minister of Culture, hired Dimitris Pikionis, a renowned architect and professor of architecture at the University of Athens, to design a pathway fitting for the destination.

The result?  A beautiful, witty, humble, elegant walkway that leads the visitor out of the hustle and bustle of the city to the entrance of the Acropolis.  Humble?  How many times have you walked over its stones and not noticed them?  Witty?  Just look at the playfulness.  Elegant?  It fits the natural contours of the area, not imposing itself, but fitting in, with harmony and balance.  Beautiful?  Look at the texture of the stones, the way the light plays with them and delights.

There could not have been a better choice for designing this walk than the master Pikionis.  He had lovingly roamed the hills and fields around Athens from the time he was a child and its spirit was planted deep in his bones.  His academic work was deeply influenced by Japanese art and architecture – the sparseness of the eastern styles a perfect match for the austerity of the Attic landscape.  The blend of these practices?  The magic beneath your feet.

 To read more: Nick Papandreou, The Magical Path to the Acropolis