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After the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans and the following trends of Greek migration to the Diaspora, Greek architecture was concentrated mainly on the Greek Orthodox churches of the Diaspora. These churches, such as other intellectual centres built by Greeks (foundations, schools, etc.), were used also as a meeting-place. The architectural style of these buildings was heavily influenced by the western European architecture.
After the Greek War of Independence and the creation of the modern Greek state, the modern Greek architecture tried to combine the traditional Greek architecture and Greek elements and motives with the western European movements and styles.
The 19th-century architecture of Athens and other cities of the Greek Kingdom is mostly influenced by the Neoclassical architecture, with architects such as Theophil Hansen, Ernst Ziller, Panagis Kalkos, Lysandros Kaftanzoglou and Stamatios Kleanthis.
Architecture was built using bated and phenixes-a special type of grass in Greece mixed in white paste.
The architecture of the modern Greek cities, especially the old centres ("old towns") is mostly influenced either by the Ottoman or the Venetian architecture, two forces that dominated the Greek space from the early modern period.
After the Greek Independence, the modern Greek architects tried to combine traditional Greek and Byzantine elements and motives with the western European movements and styles. Patras was the first city of the modern Greek state to develop a city plan. In January 1829, Stamatis Voulgaris, a Greek engineer of the French army, presented the plan of the new city to the Governor Kapodistrias, who approved it. Voulgaris applied the orthogonal rule in the urban complex of Patras. However his initial plan was modified in 1830.
Two special genres can be considered the Cycladic architecture, featuring whitewashedhouses, in the Cyclades and the Epirotic architecture in the region of Epirus, featuring stone houses.
After the establishment of the Greek Kingdom, the architecture of Athens and other cities was mostly influenced by the Neoclassical architecture. For Athens, the first King of Greece, Otto of Greece, commissioned the architects Stamatios Kleanthis and Eduard Schaubert to design a modern city plan fit for the capital of a state.
In 1917 most of Thessaloniki's old center of the city was destroyed by the Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917. Following the fire the government prohibited quick rebuilding, so it could implement the new redesign of the city according to the European-style urban plan prepared by a commission of architects headed by French architect Ernest Hébrard.
In 1933 was signed the Athens Charter, a manifesto of the modernist movement which published later by Le Corbusier. Architects of this movement were among others the Bauhaus-architect Ioannis Despotopoulos, Dimitris Pikionis, Patroklos Karantinos and Takis Zenetos.
In 1929, two important laws concerning apartment buildings took effect. The law about "horizontal property" made it possible that many different owners own one apartment building, each by owning one or more apartment units. Theoretically, each apartment corresponds to a percentage of the original plot. The most important effect of this law was the practice of "αντιπαροχή" ( antiparochí , literally "a supply in exchange"). With antiparochí, the owner of a plot, who can't afford to build an apartment building by himself, makes a contract with a construction company so that the latter will build the apartment building but keep the ownership of as many apartments as the contract states. Although during the inter-war period the practice of antiparochí was limited, as the construction of most apartment buildings was financed solely by the original owners of the plot, antiparochí became the most common method for financing the construction of condominiums (polykatoikíes) from the 1950s onwards. [1] However this practice had the negative effect of the destruction of many old-era (mostly of 19th century) buildings and mansions in the major Greek cities, to be replaced by common apartment buildings. Even today (2019), the owners of old buildings or mansions, listed as architecturally preserved, prefer to let them collapse to avoid the preservation cost and exploit the plot.
After World War II and the Greek civil war, this practice (the massive construction of condominiums in the major Greek city-centres) was a major contributory factor for the Greek economy and the post-war recovery. The first scycrapers were also constructed during the 1960s and 1970s, such as the OTE Tower and the Athens Tower Complex.
During the 1960s and 1970s, Xenia was a nationwide hotel construction program initiated by the Hellenic Tourism Organisation (Ελληνικός Οργανισμός Τουρισμού, EOT) to improve the country's tourism infrastructure. It constitutes one of the largest infrastructure projects in modern Greek history. The first manager of the project was the architect Charalambos Sfaellos (from 1950 to 1958) and from 1957 the buildings were designed by a team under Aris Konstantinidis.
Famous foreign architects who have also designed buildings in Greece during the 20th and 21st century, include Walter Gropius, Eero Saarinen and Mario Botta. Several new buildings were also constructed by Santiago Calatrava for the 2004 Athens Olympics, while Bernard Tschumi designed the New Acropolis Museum. Recently in 2012 Renzo Piano designed the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center (completed in 2016).
Greek Revival architecture was a style that began in the middle of the 18th century but which particularly flourished in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, predominantly in northern Europe, the United States, and Canada, as well as in Greece itself following its independence in 1821. It revived many aspects of the forms and styles of ancient Greek architecture, in particular the Greek temple. A product of Hellenism, Greek Revival architecture is looked upon as the last phase in the development of Neoclassical architecture, which was drawn from Roman architecture. The term was first used by Charles Robert Cockerell in a lecture he gave as an architecture professor at the Royal Academy of Arts in London in 1842.
Bernard Tschumi is an architect, writer, and educator, commonly associated with deconstructivism. Son of the well-known Swiss architect Jean Tschumi and a French mother, Tschumi is a dual French-Swiss national who works and lives in New York City and Paris. He studied in Paris and at ETH in Zurich, where he received his degree in architecture in 1969.
Stamatios or Stamatis Kleanthis was a Greek architect.
Baron Theophil Edvard von Hansen was a Danish architect who later became an Austrian citizen. He became particularly well known for his buildings and structures in Athens and Vienna, and is considered an outstanding representative of Neoclassicism and Historicism.
Neoclassical architecture, sometimes referred to as Classical Revival architecture, is an architectural style produced by the Neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century in Italy, France and Germany. It became one of the most prominent architectural styles in the Western world. The prevailing styles of architecture in most of Europe for the previous two centuries, Renaissance architecture and Baroque architecture, already represented partial revivals of the Classical architecture of ancient Rome and ancient Greek architecture, but the Neoclassical movement aimed to strip away the excesses of Late Baroque and return to a purer, more complete, and more authentic classical style, adapted to modern purposes.
The National Archaeological Museum in Athens houses some of the most important artifacts from a variety of archaeological locations around Greece from prehistory to late antiquity. It is considered one of the greatest museums in the world and contains the richest collection of Greek Antiquity artifacts worldwide. It is situated in the Exarcheia area in central Athens between Epirus Street, Bouboulinas Street and Tositsas Street while its entrance is on the Patission Street adjacent to the historical building of the Athens Polytechnic university.
Ernst Moritz Theodor Ziller was a German-born university teacher and architect who later became a Greek national. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, he was a major designer of royal and municipal buildings in Athens, Patras, and other Greek cities.
The Old Acropolis Museum was an archaeological museum located in Athens, Greece on the archeological site of Acropolis. It is built in a niche at the eastern edge of the rock and most of it lies beneath the level of the hilltop, making it largely invisible. It was considered one of the major archaeological museums in Athens. Due to its limited size, the Greek government decided in the late 1980s to build a new museum. The New Acropolis Museum is now built at the foot of the Acropolis. In June 2007 the old museum closed its doors so that its antiquities could be moved to their new home, which opened on 20 June 2009.
The Metropolitan Cathedral of the Annunciation, popularly known as the Metropolis or Mitropoli, is the cathedral church of the Archbishopric of Athens and all of Greece.
Ludwig Thiersch was a German painter, primarily of mythological and religious subjects and especially of ecclesiastical art, also influential in Greece.
Carl Rahl, sometimes spelled Karl Rahl, was an Austrian painter.
Kypseli is a neighbourhood in central Athens, Greece. It occupies much of the 6th municipal department of the municipality of Athens, and has a population of around 65,000.
The Academy of Athens is Greece's national academy, and the highest research establishment in the country. It was established in 1926, with its founding principle tracing back to the historical Academy of Plato, and operates under the supervision of the Ministry of Education. The Academy's main building is one of the major landmarks of Athens.
The Municipal Gallery of Athens is a museum in Athens, Greece. It houses a rich collection of nearly 3,000 works from leading 19th- and 20th-century Greek artists. Formerly located on Peiraios Street on Eleftherias (Koumoundourou) Square, in October 2010 the gallery moved three blocks northwest to the corner of Myllerou and Leonidou streets on Avdi Square in Metaxourgeio. The move added another dimension to the gallery's draw, as its current building was designed in the early 19th century by prominent architect Christian Hansen.
The Cathedral of Saint Andrew also called Cathedral Church of Saint Andrew or simply Hagios Andreas is a Greek Orthodox basilica in the west side of the city center of Patras in Greece. Along with the nearby old church of St. Andrew, it constitutes a place of pilgrimage for Christians from all over the world. It is dedicated to the First-called Apostle of Christ, Saint Andrew.
Gustav Eduard Schaubert 27 July 1804, Breslau, Prussia – 30 March 1860, Breslau) was a Prussian architect, who made a major contribution to the re-planning of Athens after the Greek War of Independence.
Panagis Kalkos was one of the first Greek architects of the modern Greek state. Educated in Munich, he is a representative of a strict neoclassic style in architecture. He built some of the most characteristic neoclassic buildings, both public and private, of Athens, many of which still survive today.
Lysandros Kaftanzoglou was a Greek architect of the 19th century and Chancellor of the National Technical University of Athens.
The Church of Saint Irene, also known as Hagia Irene or Hagia Eirene, is an Eastern Orthodox church in the city of Athens, Greece, built on the site of an older medieval church, located on Aiolou Street. It is dedicated to Saint Irene, and served as the metropolis of the new Greek state during the early years of independence in the 19th century. Saint Irene is venerated on May 5.
Rododafni castle is a palace in Penteli, Greece. It is located on the Lord Byron street on the slope of mount Pentelicus. It was intended as a summer residence for Sophie de Marbois-Lebrun, Duchess of Plaisance and is designed in a neo-gothical style, which was uncommon in 19th century Greece. The name of the palace means Rosetree castle.