Tis the season to be shopping, falalalalala… or so the song goes. Not an easy task for everyone, we know. Especially if you’re travelling or recently moved to a new city (hey, welcome to Athens!) and you still haven’t found your bearings. Worry not. You’ll find that Christmas in Athens holds an abundance of choices when it comes to holiday shopping, be it for trees and decorations, wine and delicacies or gifts for your loved ones (and yourself, of course). We’ve wrapped up our suggestions for some of our favourite local producers, merchants and artisans so that you feel right at home. Our Christmas gift to you.
Christmas trees and decorations
Before we start with recommendations, a little context: The tree wasn’t always the star of the Christmas show in Greece. As people of the sea, Greeks used to decorate small ship models (or karavakia) for the season, which symbolised the new adventures that would come with every new year, while also paying tribute to all the mariners. Families, especially the children, created their own model with materials available around the house: wood, fabric and paper scraps usually got the job done. Up to fifty years ago, these ships were seen in almost every household. Around the 80’s the Christmas tree took over the local festive geist and has now become the staple decoration. You can still find ready-made Christmas karavakia in local shops or at the Benaki Museum gift shop.
Nature offers all kinds of ornaments.
Photo: Thomas Gravanis
There are plenty of seasonal shops (or epochika magazia) around the city. Look for them in the general Psirri and Omonia areas (there’s also a great one over at Filolaou Street in Pangrati); you’ll find a great variety of your typical synthetic trees and decorations. For more natural and sustainable options, head over to Athens’ oldest Christmas tree market right outside the Pedion tou Areos park. Producers from the northern part of the country provide the city with trees cultivated in special crops, all bearing an authenticity stamp. Sizes vary, from one to six metres tall, as do prices, which usually start at €30 and can go up to €300. But feel free to bargain. While you’re there, make sure to head into Exarchia and towards Kopria, one of the most popular plant and flower shops in town, known for their keen eye for green trends and contemporary takes on all things leafy.
Over at the lovely area of Petralona, Maria has created Yperalfeia, her own happy place, a bright yellow flower shop where she can spread joy “with the breath of nature”, as she says. Her specialty are the gorgeous wreaths she creates all year round. For the holidays she has put together a whole collection of items: wreaths with flower fruits, dried oranges and pines, small eco friendly wooden trees dressed in greenery and small fruit like cherry plums, upside down bouquets with holly and large pine cones for you to have the perfect New Year’s kiss under. All of the above are based on scented greenery to give your space that extra holiday aroma.
A Greek Christmas feast
Whether you’re planning your own Christmas dinner or are invited to one (Greek etiquette says do not show up empty handed), you’ll need to stock up on delicacies. From their shop in the Psirri area The Arapian Family provide the city with pastourma (the Greek version of pastrami) and soutzouki (you might know it as sujuk), a dry, spicy and fermented sausage. In the past decade the same family established Ta Karamanlidika tou Fani, Greek delicatessen shops where you can find cheese, sausages and all sorts of deli products from all around Greece. Talking about local cheese, we have to mention Kostarelos, a family cheese factory since 1937. Their cheese shop in Kolonaki offers a collection of cheese products produced in house, as well as a selection of products from small greek producers of high quality. Renowned cava Kylix, is your go to for wine and spirits. Their specially trained team will guide you through the local brands and help you choose what’s best for any occasion. Here, you will also find the Greek bottarga (a delicacy of salted, cured fish) named avgotaraho, one of the few European and Greek PDO fish products, made from fish caught in the area of Messolonghi.
Whatever the case, make sure to also get some pomegranates, as they symbolise prosperity, fertility and regeneration. It’s customary to break one on the doorstep of our houses when entering it for the first time after the changing of the year, so the seeds will spread and as will good fortune.
Save room for dessert
What would Christmas be without sweets? When it comes to the staple Greek Christmas sweet, there’s a long rivalry between two types of baked goodies: melomakarona and kourabiedes. Melomakarona are cinnamon-y, orange-y biscuits, dipped in honey syrup and topped with walnuts, (some even come with chocolate coating). Be warned: the smaller they are, the more treacherous. It is said that the best ones can be found at the pastry shop of Afoi Asimakopouloi in Exarchia, run by the third generation of the family at the moment. Kourabiedes are buttery shortbreads with baked almonds, and covered with powdered sugar. The secret here is in the butter, the almond being whole and not pound, and the quality of the rosewater used. The crumblier the kourabies, the better. Asimakopouloi also excel in these, as well as in the season’s outsider, diples: thin, sheet-like dough, fried and dipped in honey syrup and topped with walnuts. There is a big chance you will find a queue outside the shop, but it’s definitely worth the wait.
Athens’ sweet tooths have been talking about Feelings ever since its opening in the summer of 2022. Inside its small and minimally decorated space in Pangrati, lauded pastry Chef Alexandrao Koniaris prepares a limited number of certain types of pastry each day, that range from lemon custards with sheep milk yoghurt, an excellent pistachio choux, and hybrid cakes, all of which are always experimented on to the customer’s delight. We hear that for this festive season he is preparing a special edition Mont Blanc cake.
Dress to impress
There’s certainly no shortage of Greek chic when it comes to fashion choices for the holidays. Dimitris Parthenis opened his first store in Athens in 1970 and his Mykonos store followed a few years later. It was there where he was discovered by the island’s jetsetter crowd who fell for his elegant Greek aesthetics. Today, the Parthenis look continues through his daughter Orsalia, timeless, simple, with a unisex easy-living feel and bohemian mood. Their latest collection Re-Bounce is all about genderless frames, chic athleisure, polished basics, luxurious sustainable fabrics, re-assessing the future through the values that shaped the iconic brand in the first place.
If you're going for iconic, then go for Parthenis.
Photo: Orestis Seferoglou
In 1971, in the narrow streets of Plaka, the Kourbela family’s workshop opened with hand-knitted knitwear, quickly becoming a reference point for locals and travellers. Ioanna Kourbela serves as creative director inspired by Greek geometry and universal aesthetics. Her motto, “the garment is the home of the body”, speaks about archetypal elegance, classical and modern art, Greek radiance, natural raw materials, vibrant polymorphic forms, and lines that extend motion. This season’s collection is named Synesthesia: all senses come together to create new experiences manifesting a new beginning.
Yiorgos Eleftheriades has been creating intellectual sartorial pieces since 1997, which have been showcased across Europe. An innovative brand that uses natural and eco-friendly fabrics with timeless designs that can be worn 24/7 at any occasion. The A/W ‘22 collection Urban Transformations remains consistent to the brands aesthetics by blending fabrics and shapes unexpectedly with careful attention to balance, enhancing the personal identity and individuality.
Stuff the stockings
The art of picking gifts is not a gift (sorry) everyone has, we know. Fret not, there are plenty of amazing crafty little shops around Athens, certain to help you tick things off your Christmas shopping list. Paraphernalia has one of the most dedicated design-loving clientele who make sure to visit often in order to check out the shop’s latest additions. Owners George Karras and Angela Koutroulaki curate a constantly changing selection of new, old or upcycled objects, from home and office ware, to furniture, lighting, plants and everything in between.
If you are drawn to more pop and funky aesthetics, then A Future Perfect & Friends is where you should be headed. What began as a concept brand, founded in 2013 by two architects in Athens, has evolved into a lively, colourful design shop. Socks, mugs, jewellery, posters, clothes and much more, all imaginative and guaranteed to put a smile on the faces of your loved ones.
A stone’s throw away is the flagship store of Athens’ sweetheart jewellery brand Prigipo, a play on the Greek word for “prince”. What started as the hobby of two friends is now a decade-long love brand known throughout the country. This year marks their 10th New Year’s lucky charm, so instead of making a new one they decided to spruce up all of their previous ones and create a ten-piece collection for you to choose from. An ideal gift for locals and visitors who want to take back a piece of Athenian serendipity with them.
If splurging for your Christmas gifts is no issue, internationally acclaimed jewellery designer Yannis Sergakis has the statement pieces you’re looking for. Everyday luxury is his philosophy, and although minimalistic, his designs all include diamonds in a way that defines the concepts of discrete luxury and intriguing simplicity. The signature house collection, Charnières Pétale, incorporates fine lines made of gold and diamonds, rooted in the elegant way Greek jewellers of the past tied together metals and stones.
