A new Athens gallery has made its appearance underneath the Acropolis. The space, titled Melas Martinos, has been designed by architecture studio Local Local and sits in the neighbourhood of Monastiraki, at the foot of the ancient hill. The reimagining of an existing building, its architecture was conceived to nod to its area's and original structure's historic character, but has been refreshed and crafted in close collaboration with the client as a 21st-century art space.
Tour this modern Athens gallery by Local Local
The existing building's bones were sturdy – an old shop with three floors of storage and secondary spaces upstairs, previously inaccessible to the public. It has belonged to the client’s family, who had an antiques business, for over a hundred years.
The emerging Athens architecture studio, headed by founder Sofia Xanthakou and set in 2022, worked this memory and function into the design - cleaning up the interior to house contemporary art shows, but allowing space for antiques and furniture displays to exist in between this programme.
The early 20th-century building is surrounded by Athens' dense cityscape, packed with life and structures, as well as various archaeological digs and historical sites, such as the Roman Agora, the Library of Hadrian, and two former Ottoman mosques.
Within this rich urban environment, Melas Martinos brings its own architecture story to the mix. The 19th-century building had been added to and tweaked over the centuries, its fabric also including a series of arches on the first floor, which were added to the building in the 1960s by Greek modernist architect Takis Zenetos.
The architects tackled this sensitive and busy architectural mosaic with care, maintaining, cleaning up and sharpening its features and identity, while ensuring the interiors work for the purposes of a modern art space. The entire top floor had to be reworked and now includes an accessible terrace with a red terrazzo floor that overlooks the surroundings.
The craftspeople involved in the renovation were selected for their superior knowledge and skills, bringing back period features or creating new elements that echo the building's original spirit - such as the terrazzo with white stones and red pigment user as flooring in the balconies, executed by Nikos, 'one of the few craftsmen using traditional techniques in this format,' the team explains.
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