Taverna Kaplani: Beyond the Polykatoikia

Friday, July 27, 2018

Beyond the Polykatoikia

In Athens, the dominant architecture is the polykatoikia, the 4-5 story apartment block. They are not objectively beautiful, but they are what facilitated the growth of Athens in the post-war years. Twice Athens had to absorb enormous numbers of migrants, first in the 1920s from the population exchange, and then in the 1950s and 1960s after the horrific civil war and sudden shift from rural to urban life. There was no capital, and thousands needed housing. So a system developed where you'd give your land to a developer who would build a house with the cheap labor available, and you'd get some number of apartments in return, so you could house yourself and your children's families together at once.

But in between those endless apartment blocks, there are single-family homes...