She remains, to this day, the most awarded costume designer in Academy Awards history, with 8 Oscars for Best Costume Design and an almost absurd 35 nominations! But what makes Edith Head fascinating is not simply the trophies. Hollywood has always loved trophies. Hollywood especially loves women who can quietly disappear into service roles while manufacturing entire fantasies behind the scenes. What makes Edith Head interesting is that she never really disappeared. She became part of the mythology herself. And naturally, this irritated people.

For decades, critics and detractors argued that Head’s real talent was not costume design but self-promotion. According to them, she mastered the performance of Edith Head more successfully than the craft itself. In an era when Hollywood costume departments were populated by rigorously trained fashion illustrators and designers (many of whom helped establish an emerging American fashion identity) Head entered the profession with almost no formal fashion training at all! Yet somehow, she outlived nearly everyone!

She survived the transition from silent films to sound, the collapse of the studio system, the changing aesthetics of postwar cinema, and eventually the rise of New Hollywood. While other legendary designers became frozen inside a particular glamorous decade, Edith adapted. Again and again. Which, frankly, is its own kind of genius.

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THE SLIGHTLY SCANDALOUS BEGINNING

The origin story is almost too good to be true.

Before Edith Head became Edith Head, she was a language teacher with a Master’s degree in Romance Languages from Stanford. Not exactly the obvious path toward dressing Kim Novak in icy Hitchcockian perfection! She taught French by day at “The Hollywood School for Girls” until administrators, noticing she was competent and dependable, casually asked whether she could also teach art classes. Small problem: she was not actually an artist. Still, in true ambitious-woman fashion, she simply said yes.

So Edith spent her days teaching art and her nights secretly attending art classes herself, trying to stay one step ahead of her students. But teaching paid terribly and Hollywood was right there, glowing seductively nearby like a giant illuminated promise. So she decided she would become a costume designer.

The way she entered Paramount lore is still delightfully controversial. In 1923, despite having little professional design experience, the twenty-six-year-old Edith managed to secure an interview as a costume sketch artist at Famous Players–Lasky, the studio that would later become Paramount Pictures! For the interview, she assembled a portfolio partly made up of sketches borrowed from fellow art students. Years later, she openly admitted it. “I borrowed sketches, I didn’t steal them,” she insisted. “I asked everybody in the class for a few costume design sketches.”

Honestly? This may be the single most Hollywood origin story imaginable. Not talent alone. Not connections alone. Not even fraud exactly. Just audacity.

And once she got inside the studio system, she proved she deserved to stay there. At Paramount she trained under legendary designers Howard Greer and Travis Banton, both masters of Old Hollywood glamour. Edith later described how generously they mentored her, allowing her into fittings and teaching her through observation rather than intimidation. It became the education she never formally had. And perhaps that outsider status ultimately became her advantage. Because Edith Head did not worship fashion in the same way many designers did. She worshipped character.

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SHE DESIGNED WOMEN, NOT DRESSES

This is where Edith Head fundamentally differed from many of her contemporaries. At the time, costume designers often imposed their own aesthetic onto actresses. Their visual signatures became recognisable across films regardless of who the character was supposed to be. Head approached things differently. She believed clothing existed to serve narrative. Not the ego of the designer. Not even beauty itself.

A woman in a Hitchcock film should look controlled, dangerous, restrained, or psychologically fractured depending on what the story required. A socialite should move differently from a secretary. A princess should not dress like a bored suburban wife. A woman in emotional collapse should not look editorial. To Edith, costume design was storytelling. Which is probably why her work still feels modern.

She herself said: “Costume design is to tell a story. It has nothing to do with fashion.” That sentence alone feels almost radical now. Especially in an era where cinema sometimes resembles an expensive influencer campaign.

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THE FILMS

The list of classics attached to Edith Head is almost ridiculous. All About Eve. Sunset Boulevard. Rear Window. Sabrina. Funny Face. A Place in the Sun. The Ten Commandments. More than four hundred films across a fifty-year career.

She dressed Audrey Hepburn, Grace Kelly, Elizabeth Taylor, Rita Hayworth, Ginger Rogers, Barbara Stanwyck, Bette Davis, Shirley MacLaine, Kim Novak, and practically every woman who ever leaned dramatically against a staircase in black-and-white cinema.

“From then on I had Edith Head’s name written into every contract, no matter what studio I was working for.”

– Barbara Stanwyck

Unlike many of her male contemporaries, Head consulted extensively with actresses. She listened to them. Collaborated with them. Adjusted silhouettes to suit their personalities and insecurities. This made her beloved among stars. She understood that costume design was psychological. A dress could change posture. A neckline could create confidence. A silhouette could transform the rhythm of movement. Olivia de Havilland once said that simply putting on Edith’s costumes helped her understand her characters instantly.

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HITCHCOCK, RESTRAINT, AND CONTROLLED GLAMOUR

Her relationship with Alfred Hitchcock deserves its own chapter.

The two first collaborated on Notorious in 1946, when Ingrid Bergman specifically requested Edith Head. It was an ideal pairing. Hitchcock disliked costumes that screamed for attention. He wanted clothing to operate psychologically and almost invisibly within the frame. Edith understood this instinctively.

The costumes she created for Hitchcock heroines were elegant but restrained, glamorous yet controlled, often communicating emotional tension through precision rather than excess. No unnecessary spectacle, just tension.

Which, if you think about it, is also how Hitchcock filmed women. The icy perfection of Grace Kelly in Rear Window. The haunting sophistication of Kim Novak in Vertigo.

The polished blonde armor of Tippi Hedren. Edith Head understood that elegance can sometimes function as a prison. And Hitchcock loved that!

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THE EDITH HEAD UNIFORM

Ironically, the woman responsible for dressing Hollywood fantasy dressed herself with almost startling practicality. She famously preferred only four colors: black, white, beige, and brown. While actresses floated around in satin gowns and impossible silhouettes, Edith herself appeared in conservative suits, sensible shoes, and her now-iconic thick-framed glasses.

She almost looked like a strict librarian accidentally trapped inside Paramount Studios, which made her strangely unforgettable. There is something deeply chic about women who become visually iconic without appearing to try.

Her appearance later inspired Edna Mode from The Incredibles, although Edith would probably have hated Edna’s dramatic capes.

THE CRITICISM

Of course, not everyone admired her. Some critics argued her designs lacked historical accuracy. Others believed more technically gifted designers around her never received equal recognition because Edith was simply better at navigating Hollywood politics. And honestly, both things can partially be true. But the obsession with “accuracy” sometimes misses the point entirely. Edith Head was not trying to recreate museum displays. She was trying to create cinematic memory.

When accused of historical inaccuracy, she reportedly responded that she was “not a historian.” Which feels like the perfect Edith Head answer. Blunt. Practical. Slightly dismissive and very Hollywood.

WHY SHE STILL MATTERS

What fascinates us most about Edith Head is that she did not emerge from some mythical fantasy of effortless genius. She learned publicly. She improvised. She borrowed. She observed. She adapted. And then she built one of the most legendary careers in Hollywood history. There is something strangely modern about her. Not in the aesthetics necessarily, although many still feel timeless. But in the strategy. She understood visibility. She understood branding. She understood collaboration. She understood psychology. And above all, she understood that clothes are never just clothes. Especially in cinema.They are mood. They are aspiration. They are emotional camouflage. They are fantasy.

Which is probably why Edith Head still lingers everywhere. Not just in old Hollywood films but in the way fashion continues to sell us characters one hopes they might become.

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We’ve been calling the shade lichen gold because it behaves exactly the way lichen does: adaptable, atmospheric, capable of belonging almost anywhere. Which is also how we’ve been wearing it, from morning errands to evenings that accidentally end at 2 a.m.

*For this edit, we styled the Kinkajú playsuit and the Momoto dress, though more naturally dyed silk pieces are on the way.

Alexandra's

Silk, I’ve realized, is at its best when it’s not trying to perform as Silk™. Not lacquered, not precious. It wants company from fabrics that move the same way it does, like viscose, tencel, washed cotton, or, even better, silk on silk. Anything with a little slouch and liquidity. Together they create that tiny, invisible pocket of air between body and clothing that feels essential on certain days.

I’ve become particularly devoted to the equation of long sleeves + mini hem in warm weather. An ecru silk-viscose shirt knotted over the “Momoto” mini dress creates exactly that kind of ease. The silhouette fractures into what looks like two separate pieces, while carving shape back into all that fluidity. It cinches without gripping and allows the naturally dyed marbled silk underneath to peek through exactly where it should, like the punchline of the outfit. Boat shoes, beige socks, and a cap keep it from feeling too precious.

Continuing the silk-on-silk agenda, the “Momoto” mini dress becomes a tank top here simply by being tucked into a pair of high-waisted silk trousers, proof that sometimes styling is really just strategic confusion. The lichen-gold shade against tobacco and chocolate brown creates the palette that feels best in the first half of the day: earthy and oxidized. Like Vanilla Coke in a hotel lobby that still smells faintly of sunscreen from the 1970s.

The essentials remain non-negotiable: boat shoes, square sunglasses, and a blazer in matching tones thrown over the shoulders with absolutely no practical justification.

Summer layering is complicated because the weather insists on realism while fashion absolutely does not. The only real loophole, I’ve found, is transparencies. A sheer sleeveless blouse underneath the ‘Kinkajú’ playsuit creates just enough visual interference. The tiny glimpses of black silk through the V-neckline, echoed again in the sheer socks, turn the whole thing slightly nocturnal without requiring an actual jacket commitment, though naturally I added the brocade blazer anyway.

There is something very satisfying to me about combining organically dyed silk with things that feel faintly corporate goth: padded shoulders, patent Mary Janes, black and sharp enough sunglasses.

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Valisia’s

This is a very casual summer outfit for me, but naturally there’s a twist because we have print involved. A mini dress - always. Not just to show the legs, although denying them would be rude, but because in summer the looser and freer the outfit feels, the better. Which is also why, for once, I skipped the belt, even though cinching my waist is usually part of my personality.

I paired the “Momoto” dress with a simple black T-shirt underneath because black needs to appear somewhere. And then a pair of sheer knee-high socks for a slightly “Clueless” atmosphere, as if Cher Horowitz spent one emotionally confusing summer in Athens and developed a taste for humidity and existential dread.

I’m keeping the same cool, effortless atmosphere here, but obviously with a twist because “simple” has never really been part of my emotional vocabulary. I always need something slightly off, slightly extra, slightly as if the outfit has a backstory.

This time I’m wearing the mini “Momoto” dress as a tank top, paired with my father’s old Nautica trousers, which are dramatically bigger than my actual size - exactly the point. I love the attitude of oversized trousers in the summer. They create that perfect “I just threw this on” illusion that actually requires very specific instincts. Which means the belt becomes essential here. Otherwise we risk entering accidental fisherman territory.

And of course I had to bring in a hat. Not just any hat, but this “Blanc” sculptural straw hat I’m obsessed with and almost never wear because the natural shade usually annoys me. Too sensible. Too earthy. But with these washed neutrals and the black accessories, suddenly it makes sense.

This look… I’m sorry, but even I can’t fully explain it. Which usually means it’s working. At least for me!

We have the very playful “Kinkajú” playsuit that could have easily gone into “cute summer outfit” territory, which of course meant I had to sabotage it slightly. I wanted eccentricity. Confusion.

So in comes the old upcycled Columbia flap hat, which exists somewhere between a hat, a scarf, and survival gear for an extremely chic apocalypse. I’m obsessed with how strange it makes everything feel. Suddenly the outfit has narrative.

Underneath, I added cycling shorts because I wanted that slightly unhinged “let’s dance for six hours” energy. And then, naturally, a turtleneck underneath the playsuit because I needed the silhouette to feel sharper, more athletic, slightly dystopian. Athleisure has become my latest obsession, but obviously I cannot approach it in a normal way. I don’t want to look like I came from pilates. I want to look like I came from a New Beat festival in Belgium in 1987.

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Stella’s

I love suits, even during spring and summer. But I’ve found that, in order for them to work and not feel or look out of place, their materiality needs to change. So it’s silk instead of wool. It’s also (bermuda) shorts instead of full-length tailored trousers, and, most importantly, relaxed dresses instead of tucked-in shirts. Christiana Vardakou’s beautiful natural dye is surprisingly versatile. It works with every colour I’ve paired it with, but it complements browns the most. It highlights the other shades while simultaneously remaining the subtle protagonist.

Ok, another suit, but this time a skirt suit. As I said above, browns really make this hand-dye pop. I love espresso/macchiato/milk chocolate (you name it!) tones the most. Here I’m using a trick I used to live for 20 years ago: wearing a skirt over a slightly longer dress, because layering was my life. I discovered I still love it. It’s just an extra sliver of fabric, but it creates continuity and adds a playful element to an outfit. Heels of any height are my go-to with a skirt suit, and with any suit, to be honest. There’s something about the combination of a pointed toe, wide-leg trousers , and an oversized jacket.

My spring ‘throw on and go out’ look. My first priority when temperatures start to rise is always comfort. The Kinkajú playsuit is airy enough to feel like you have nothing on, but the layered sleeves give it substance as well.

The (macchiato) bike shorts are here because it’s not summer yet, so you still need an extra layer of fabric, even in the morning. My trusty spring shoe, the velvet Fruilane slippers, is, yes, very comfortable (they are slippers after all) but their colour is also this perfect dark greenish hue with a golden tint (hence the name “Bottiglia”) that sets itself apart from the browns while somehow being the perfect match for them.

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Bisous bisous

Alexandra + Valisia + Stella

Historically, hats have always carried a certain weight: crowns of aristocracy, towering top hats, statements of power stitched into every curve and brim. Today, the narrative has shifted, but the allure remains. There’s something undeniably empowering about wearing a hat. It demands attention, it frames your face, it elevates your style, it occasionally steals the entire show - and quite unapologetically so. Whether it’s an oversized brim flirting with drama or a casual cap pretending to be low-key, hats have this rare ability to reveal personality without saying a word.

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In the Music Industry

The Blitz Kids

Taking the runway

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Captured Through the Lens

More 80's

On Screen

Iconic Outfits in Film

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Moments That Defined

Headwear is all about presence! And if you’re going to make an entrance, you might as well start from the top!

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Painted by Hieronymus Bosch, the iconoclastic Northern Renaissance mind who somehow made religion feel surreal before surrealism had a name, it unfolds like a world where the sacred and the absurd are in constant, slightly awkward conversation. Bosch had humor - actual humor - and he used it. Evil, in his universe, isn’t always terrifying; it’s often ridiculous. Think tiny demons shaped like funnels (yes, the one you use for olive oil), grotesque little creatures that feel more like satire than a threat.

His fantastical scenes blur everything we like to keep separate: beauty and grotesquery, the mundane and the divine, pleasure and punishment. No one can fully explain what any of it means. Not definitively. We’re looking at an almost 500-year-old visual language from a medieval mind we can’t fully access, so interpretation becomes a kind of projection.

Trying to decode Bosch can feel a bit like trying to explain David Lynch; you can get close, circle the ideas, but clarity is never the point.

Some have called him heretical to make sense of the chaos, but that misses it entirely. He basically treated religion as a living system for imagination, irony, and zero interest in being obvious.

One more detail. Close the triptych: when the wings shut, you’re confronted with the Third Day of Creation, painted in grisaille.

Grey tones only. Why no colour?

Because the sun and the moon haven’t been created yet.

Colour, theologically, isn’t possible yet. When you open the panels, the burst of colour hits like a shock.

The Garden of Earthly Delights is a triptych oil painting created between 1490 and 1510, currently in the Museo del Prado in Spain, where photography is apparently forbidden. Which feels a little over-the-top, until you remember there is literally no way to pick a single moment from something this overloaded without your brain short-circuiting.

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It’s split into 3 panels, and it only keeps getting weirder the longer you look. On the left, there’s this oddly (seemingly) perfect “Garden of Eden” situation, showing God introducing Eve to Adam in a pristine, peaceful landscape that already feels a little suspicious.

In the middle, things go fully spiral in a sprawling, chaotic scene with naked figures everywhere, giant fruit, and this very “what is happening” wonder that feels like paradise but also definitely not.

And then on the right, it fully drops into nightmare territory. A dark, chaotic landscape where punishment becomes almost theatrical, the “Tree-Man” stands out as the iconic figure (possibly Hieronymus Bosch’s self portrait), and musical instruments are transformed into torture devices.

The Garden of Eden (Paradise)

Left Panel

Bosch didn’t conceive paradise as a perfect starting point. He conceived it as a process already moving toward its end before it had even begun. Every creature, every hunting scene in the left panel is a deliberately placed record: the Fall isn’t an event. It’s a direction that was always already there.

A lion tears apart an antelope, a cat hunts a mouse, a monstrous bird swallows a frog. Death is already present in Paradise.

“If we look closely, the only thing that connects Paradise with Hell is sin.”

Sin doesn’t begin in the Hell of the right panel. It begins in the Paradise of the left. Bosch chose to tell the story of sin not from its consequences, but from its source. Larry Silver, Professor of Art History at the University of Pennsylvania, makes this concrete. A three-headed amphibian crawls out of the pool surrounding the Eden fountain. In the dark marshland of the foreground: a unicorn-seahorse composite, a winged fish, a three-headed bird. In Silver’s words: hybrid figures found in no bestiary. Right in front of Adam and Eve.

The Garden of Earthly Delights (False Paradise)

Central Panel

The setting itself—a lush garden—would have connoted lust to Bosch’s contemporaries. “For centuries, the garden had functioned as a setting for lovers and love-making”.

Fruit in 3 acts

In the first panel, a scene from the Garden of Eden, all of the fruits are safely on the trees. The middle panel shows creatures eating the fruits, and the last panel has no fruits because it depicts the consequences of eating them.

Early descriptions of the triptych refer to it as the ‘strawberry painting’, and the fruit appears several times in the central panel. It allows Bosch to reference other forms of imagery: in one section, people pick apples from trees while a man offers a strawberry to a woman with a leering expression, a twist on biblical depictions of Eden. In another, couples feed each other berries, a scene traditionally associated with courtly romance, yet here they are doing more than merely flirting. Bosch ‘subverts and perverts’ the theme of courtly love, with “‘love fruit’, a traditional metaphor for amorous union, both religious and worldly, now transformed into a hellish prison”.

Plucking fruit, which happens all over this panel, symbolized copulation; and Bosch’s swimming figures were likely nods to the 16th-century Dutch expression “swim in the bath of Venus,” which meant being in love.

The birds could also be taken as a double entendre.

As well as being an obsolete plural form, the Dutch word ‘vogelen’ (vogel = bird) could refer to having sexual intercourse.

In the middle of it all…

The fountain placed at the heart of the panel offers another sign that all is not well. In form, it mirrors the shimmering, crystalline wellspring seen to the left, in the Paradise panel. The surface of this one, however, is cracked, “thus conveying the idea of the ephemeral nature of earthly pleasures”.

Clothing feels like an optional idea that never really made it into the central panel.

Instead, you get hundreds of naked figures moving through this hyper-saturated world of excess, frolicking through lush green fields, gathering under strawberries the size of furniture, slipping into fountains, or emerging from giant eggs. It’s all very “anything goes,” but also slightly unhinged. The nudity reads more like exposure in every sense of the word. Everyone is fully in it, fully visible, fully giving in to impulse, which is probably why the whole scene feels like pleasure and confusion happening at the exact same time.

Gordon Williams suggests that shellfish have been ‘venereal symbols’ since ancient times, arguing that although Bosch’s shell is from a mussel rather than an oyster, “it has a scattering of semen pearls… Pliny mentions a species of mussel called Venereae, or Venus-Shell”.

The giant, bug-eyed owls placed on either side of the central panel hinted at evil in Bosch’s time, the hollow fruits dotting the landscape “signified something worthless, which was of course the way in which the medieval moralizers viewed the carnal act.”

The animals that cover the central panel also evoke carnal urges.

We know that fish, which crop up several times here, referenced the phallus in Old Netherlandish proverbs. The hordes of figures riding on the backs of bulls, horses, and fantastical creatures likewise allude to animal appetites and the act of sex itself. But while these figures are certainly enjoying themselves, Bosch also gestures to the ephemerality of fleshy pleasures—and to the fate that will follow.

Hell (Damnation)

Right Panel

Bosch’s hell panel is a far cry from other mediaeval depictions of inferno, where we often see people being boiled, burned or eaten alive. The suffering going on in this panel is not just on the physical level, it’s also psychological: the souls are being driven mad by fear, anxiety, chaos and distress.

The Tree Man

This odd creation has a human face and is crouching forward, it seems. The shoulders are propped up by legs resembling tree trunks, with branches sticking out. The Tree Man is balanced on two small boats, in which a group of people try to find shelter. In the tavern inside the Tree Man’s torso, a woman is pulling pints from a barrel, and we see a cross bow hanging from a tree. A man is sitting on a giant toad, a symbol of the devil.

The head of the Tree Man is surmounted by a large bagpipe, the instrument of sloth and idleness. The tiny flag on his eggshell back also shows a bagpipe. It may well have been sloth and alcohol abuse that caused the figures in the diabolical tavern to end up in hell.

When Music Turns Punitive

Those being punished for playing secular music are tortured with instruments; one man is splayed on a harp, another resigned to life with sheet music written on his ass.

What Flows Beneath Prosperity

In mediaeval days, the river running through the heart of ‘s-Hertogenbosch was an open sewer. Its stench pervaded the streets of the city. Only the very rich could afford a ‘closet’ perched above the river where they could relieve themselves in private. Ordinary people would defecate straight into the river. The elegant potty chair painted by Bosch would only be found in the homes of the city’s wealthiest. After his marriage with Aleid, he would become one of them. And most likely a similar chair took pride of place in his home.

On the edge of the sewer we see three figures. One rich ‘stinker’ is pooping coins. The figure right next to him is throwing up. Bosch had made an earlier painting themed on the seven sins.

Could it be he is depicting gluttony and greed here?

“I decided to transcribe it into modern notation, assuming the second line of the staff is C, as is common for chants of this era,” (in 2015, this score was transcribed and brought to life by university student Amelia Hamrick)

The 500-Year-Old Butt Song from Hell…

as it’s also known, is an entrancing piece: played on lute, harp and hurdy-gurdy or sung in a Gregorian choral arrangement, the music soars beyond a tiny patch of paint on the third panel of a triptych.

It might seem that the pig in a nun’s habit is the most significant element of this detail: but the amputated foot in fact offers the more surprising insight. Bosch paints the sawn-off appendage as a reminder of a condition known as St Anthony’s Fire – gangrene caused by eating bread infected with a black mould, or ergot fungus. In the 1950s, a component of the fungus was synthesised to create LSD.

“If you ate bread from the wrong baker… limbs would rot away while the mind would be addled by hallucinations, ultimately leading to insanity. Did Hieronymus Bosch paint his Garden of Earthly Delights while suffering from a bad trip?”

You could spend hours trying to make sense of every single element in The Garden of Earthly Delights and still feel like something slipped past you. It’s less a puzzle to solve than a field of possibilities you move through, where interpretation feels provisional at best.

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Bibliography =

Pilar Silva Maroto, curator at the Museo del Prado

Hieronymus Bosch, The Garden of Earthly Delights (Full Length): Great Art Explained

Arthive: Who knows? Bosch knows.

The Garden of Earthly Delights Tour

Commented Works: The Garden of Earthly Delights, by Hieronymus Bosch

Artsy.net

Diamanda Galás is not a singer, nor a performer. There is no single musical genre that encompasses what she does. She immerses herself in subjects with which she feels a deep emotional connection: poetry, torture, loss, the Holokaftoma (Asia Minor Greek genocide), as well as the Greek, Assyrian, Armenian, Yazidi, and Azeri genocides, social stigma and war.

She spends hours reading poems in their original language, translating them with the aid of a dictionary, researching the multiple meanings of words, taking notes, and investigating every detail. For the Holokaftoma alone, she spent countless hours writing essays and doing research.

“I extrovert pain and these things that would destroy me.”

Her highly original and politically charged performance works have earned her worldwide recognition. The depth of her research results in works that are holistic and demanding of the listener.

Her singing, while adjacent to contemporaneous practitioners of extended vocal techniques and sound poetry, remains rooted in traditional musics, bridging past and present, the sacred and the profane.

“Sometimes I will fall across a poem and, if it resonates with me for a long enough time, or if it hits me and I can’t move on from it, I will interpret it.”

One of the Greek traditions from which she draws is the singing of mirologia. Dirge singers place a hand on the head or chest of the deceased and begin the lament. Just before finishing, one singer takes hold of another mirologistra, who continues the song, and then another joins in turn. In this way, there is no silence, and the uninterrupted continuation of the lament allows the dead to pass to the next station unimpeded. It is a deeply sacred belief system.

“I like to start working on a piece without any idea of where it’s going. I want no ideas at all; it has to have a propulsion and an incantational structure.”

More recently, her performance work has focused on the musical setting of texts by exiled poets and writers from around the world. Her work-in-progress, Espergesia (with words by Cesar Vallejo, from The Black Heralds), was performed solo a cappella in the Emanuel Vigeland Mausoleum in Oslo, without electronics or amplification, within the space’s natural 25-second reverberation, in complete darkness.

“You have to be a person who is eaten alive by a poem. You have to sacrifice yourself.”

She also presented a performance of Schrei 27 in Spain. It was not performed live, but rather presented in a quadraphonic installation within a small, completely dark room. The presenter locked the doors, so that the audience couldn’t leave.

Broken Gargoyles (2022), was inspired in part by the German poet Georg Heym.

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Nina Hagen

There has never been anything remotely normal about Nina Hagen, and thank God for that. Hair, makeup, voice, behavior. Everything about her felt like it had escaped from a parallel universe where restraint simply never developed as a concept.

Crowned the “Godmother of German Punk”. However, her sound doesn’t sit still long enough to be categorized. Punk crashes into opera, then detours through funk, electronica, reggae, jazz - sometimes within the same song, sometimes within the same breath. Trained, yes, but never obedient. That soprano voice, stretching across octaves, slips from spoken word to shrieks to something eerily operatic, as if she’s both performing and haunting her own music at the same time.

Listening to a Nina Hagen record feels like wandering into a haunted house on excellent drugs: disorienting, theatrical, slightly dangerous, and impossible to forget.

And then there’s the image. Along with her vocal abandon, she famously experimented with her on-stage look, rarely shying away from appearing outlandish, eccentric, or even downright creepy. Even when she appears almost “normal,” there’s always a twist. For instance, in a Spanish TV performance of “New York,” she is wearing a “simple,” typical black outfit of hers. That is until you notice a pair of exaggerated silicone breasts, turning the whole thing into pure, subversive humour.

Activist, provocateur, shape-shifter. Completely uninterested in behaving. Entirely committed to herself.

Laurie Spiegel

Laurie Spiegel pioneered new ways of composing music using computers, making it possible to improvise digitally and to create interactive software instruments. Her work helped shape what we now take for granted: the image of the electronic musician working on a laptop, whether onstage or at home.

For the first time, composers could directly create and hear their sounds, instead of writing them down and relying on others to perform them.

“You were making the sounds yourself, as opposed to writing them down on a score and then hoping you could persuade a conductor and an orchestra to turn them into sound. You could immediately hear the realization of your ideas.”

“You could work on music the way an artist did on a painting, seeing (hearing) what you were making while making it. That was not possible before, except for pieces you were writing for a single instrument that you played yourself and that were technically within your own abilities to play.”

Early modular synthesizers were hands-on and intuitive. Computers were more complex, but gave composers full control, often through tools they built themselves. For Laurie Spiegel, an improviser, that direct connection was the draw.

Laurie Spiegel pushed the boundaries of early computer music through her work on GROOVE (Generating Realtime Operations On Voltage-controlled Equipment), a groundbreaking Bell Labs system that made real-time interaction with electronic sound possible, and its later video-based extension, VAMPIRE (Video and Music Program for Interactive Real Time Exploration and Experimentation).

In 1980, she released the album The Expanding Universe, created using the synthesizers at Bell Laboratories. Around this time, she began developing her own software for personal computers, called Music Mouse. It allowed her to shape sound in a more detailed and immediate way, adding richness and complexity while keeping a sense of lightness and emotion. In 1986, she developed this intelligent, interactive software for Macintosh, Atari, and Amiga computers, allowing users to turn their computers into playable musical instruments.

Also, her computer-based interpretation of Johannes Kepler’s 17th-century work was selected by Carl Sagan to be included on the Voyager 1 and 2 probes to represent Earth's music in space!

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Nina Simone

Nina Simone was one of the most extraordinary artists of the twentieth century, an icon of American music. She was the consummate musical storyteller, a griot as she would come to learn, who used her remarkable talent to create a legacy of liberation, empowerment, passion, and love through a magnificent body of works. She earned the moniker “High Priestess of Soul” for she could weave a spell so seductive and hypnotic that the listener lost track of time and space as they became absorbed in the moment.

She was a fearless, classically trained pianist who pivoted to become a defiant voice of the Civil Rights Movement, prioritizing her activism over comfort. She unapologetically infused her music with raw rage and truth, famously releasing “Mississippi Goddam” in response to racial violence, and directly challenged mainstream white expectations with an uncompromising, militant attitude.

Nina Simone has offered her listeners solace through music. The history of America, of blackness, of womanhood, is woven through her voice. We think that her greatest achievement was her radical vulnerability. Her refusal to hide her emotions and experiences. She wields her honesty like a weapon, destroying taboos and social ills.

Nina Simone was a real badass: unafraid of confrontation, allergic to compromise, and utterly unwilling to make herself smaller for anyone.

Pauline Oliveros

Pauline Oliveros was a composer, performer, teacher, philosopher, innovator, and humanitarian committed to building community through listening and understanding. A central figure in the avant-garde, she was a founding member of the ‘San Francisco Tape Music Center’ and a trailblazer for women in electronic arts.

Her work moved fluidly between performance, recording, writing, and teaching. Over the course of her career, she created scores, books, and a series of sonic practices, while also establishing an arts center.

“Creative work really comes naturally to kids: they are creative and improvising all the time. Then when you start to learn symbolic notation to form traditional music, then you’re discouraged from improvising.”

At the core of her practice was the concept of Deep Listening: a philosophy of heightened awareness that encourages “listening with your whole body,” connecting sound with consciousness and self-awareness.

In the early 1970s, she introduced Sonic Meditations, a series of text-based instructions that shifted attention toward environmental sound and collective, meditative sound-making, rather than traditional composition.

She also developed the Extended Instrument System (EIS), an interactive electronic processing system that allowed her to expand the sonic possibilities of her accordion through delay and real-time transformation.

Working in a field largely dominated by men, she became an important model for generations of experimental composers and educators.

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Lydia Lunch

If you’re looking for something soft, soothing, or remotely polite, stay far away from Lydia Lunch. Since the late ’70s, her entire artistic mission has been to agitate: emotionally, sexually, politically. Her unapologetic sexuality and open contempt for passivity never made her a media darling. Good. She was never auditioning for approval.

If you want truth without the flattering lighting, Lydia is your destination. Film, writing, records - whatever she touches comes out sharpened, weaponised, unforgettable.

A central figure of the No Wave scene, she arrived in New York at sixteen and walked straight into its chaos, quickly becoming one of its most confrontational voices. With Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, alongside James Chance and others, she dismantled both rock’s tired rebellion and its even more tired ideas about women. No seduction, no decoration, just confrontation.

Meredith Monk

Meredith Monk is redefining vocal music through "extended vocal techniques," treating the voice as a versatile instrument capable of sounds beyond words, including clicks, hums, and cries. She revolutionized interdisciplinary performance by blending music, movement, film, and theater, pioneering site-specific art in unconventional spaces.

Her groundbreaking exploration of the voice as an instrument, as an eloquent language in and of itself, expands the boundaries of musical composition, creating landscapes of sound that unearth feelings, energies, and memories for which there are no words.

Starting in the mid-1960s, Monk broke away from traditional singing to explore the voice's ability to produce primal, emotional sounds. She spans a wide, often wordless range, creating a "landscape" of sounds that function as a high-octane instrument.

When language does appear, it is rarely used in a conventional, narrative sense. Words emerge instead as chants or lists, stripped of theatrical affect and integrated into the overall sonic texture.

Alongside her vocal innovations, she has been a key figure in interdisciplinary performance. She developed a “unified form” that brings together music, movement, film, and theater, creating works that move fluidly across artistic boundaries.

In 1968, she founded The House, a company dedicated to this approach. Around the same time, she began presenting work in unconventional spaces, helping pioneer site-specific performance. In 1969, she created Juice, the first live art event in the rotunda of the Guggenheim Museum.

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(The same thing happens when the temperature drops after summer -but then, the answer is white shirts.)

Back to denim, though.

Stella’s

I’m not much of a denim person, I prefer tailored wool trousers over everything. BUT I admit they are extremely versatile and a perfect transitional piece. Because I don’t wear denim often, I always feel like the possibilities are endless when I do.

Even though I only own 2 pairs of jeans (both Levi’s, both men’s, both 501s), I’ve developed a bit of an obsession with a particular wash and that is raw denim. It feels very classic (and I’m a big fan of that) yet still elevated. For some reason, I love it even more with

a pop of red(ish)

( ^ here I wear pretty much the same things but more casually and layered)

Clearly inspired by Valisia’s choice of The Wild One, I tucked a silk scarf in my back pocket and felt very badass. Even while wearing a crisper than crisp white shirt and kitten heels (but, they are dirty so, yes, badass). Maybe it’s the denim effect?

I recently watched Rififi and was really inspired by the way Jean Servais wears his silk scarf (apparently, French jewel thieves in the ’50s wore silk scarves). He wears it back-to-front —that is, with the triangular part visible and the knot at the back.

That’s what I did here, but I used a silk mantón instead of a regular scarf, because I love the gold embroidery and the fringe. In this case, it also works as jewellery, because as we said I’m inspired by a jewel thief!

Did I watch Miami Vice right after Rififi? You tell me.

Here we have my second (and last) pair of denim jeans —essentially the same as the previous one, but in a light wash. It’s finally the season to wear my new Gillies coat-turned-oversized-blazer on repeat. I chose to make it in white instead of black because it feels very fresh to me (or very ’80s to everyone else).

Up until now, I’ve worn it as an all-white look, or all-white with black accessories. But it’s spring, so I swapped tailored trousers for denim, and somehow, it looks even more ’80s.

At the same time, it’s so effortless you could easily wear it somewhere with more trees and less cement over the Easter break. The matching wool blouse keeps the look minimal while still keeping you warm (because let’s face it, it’s not cami season just yet).

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Alexandra’s

A good pair of jeans is never enough for me. Two isn’t either. I like having options; different fits, lighter denim for summer, more rigid ones for winter, and a full range of shades from deep black to faded indigo. Jeans are my shortcut. When I don’t have the time (or energy) to think about what to wear, they just work.

I’ve recently developed a mild fixation on bootcut jeans, which feels both regressive and strangely progressive at once. Their particular thing is in how they redistribute proportion and elongate the legs, especially when counterbalanced with something a bit more architectural on top.

In this case: a high-waisted black flared pair, styled with the KALLONI blouse (stand collar, short sleeves, handwoven decoration, and a circular side slit that gives the leg space to be visible), and grounded with chunky patent leather boots. The look nods to the early ’00s, certainly, but also—somewhat inexplicably—to the styling language of Wong Kar Wai.

All black, which simplifies things. It works across the day without much intervention - proof that a couple of thoughtful pieces can carry more weight than an overworked outfit.

Sticking to my “two pieces are more than enough” rule (self-imposed, but persuasive), I kept the bootcut silhouette and added a silk and viscose blazer. The challenge, of course, is that a blazer tends to corporate-ify everything on contact. Classic blue denim helps counter that, reintroducing ease and keeping the look from tipping too far into formality.

Spring has sprung, and it invites a certain looseness. So skip the layer underneath, leave the blazer slightly undone, and allow for a hint of skin. It softens the structure and makes the whole outfit feel like it happened rather than being overthought.

Oversized jeans? Don’t pair with a tight top. Pair with another oversized thing, obviously.

For this look, I grabbed what might be the most oversized, relaxed, low-waisted pair of dusty blue jeans in my closet. They immediately set a laid-back mood. Normally, I’d throw on a loose white shirt to float over them (it’s a classic I love) but this time, I went for something architectural instead. Literally architectural, as the tonal paneled design on the نوسناي shirt reads like a Marrakech doorway. Yes, your casual outfit can read like a travel poster!

Loose-on-loose is a negotiation. One element must give, and here it’s the shirt, which is left slightly unbuttoned. The jeans, by contrast, are allowed their full glory (as long as they touch the floor). I added red ballet flats for a pop of colour.

*A small tip: if you’re navigating Athens, fold those hems as the city’s streets are merciless. But if you happen to be in Tokyo, let them swing!

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Valisia’s

This might be my favorite look of them all. And also the most “traditional.” Or at least, traditional in theory.

Because when I think of jeans, there’s always that image lurking somewhere in the background: the cowboy, the blue denim, the boots firmly planted in the dust. A uniform that was never meant to be aesthetic, but somehow became one. So naturally, I go for the full denim situation. A matching denim shirt, because if you’re going to reference something, you might as well commit.

And then, I interrupt it with the corduroy Bruce of Kinnaird jacket which comes in to completely shift the narrative. It carries that unmistakable countryside energy, almost aristocratic in attitude, with its structured presence and tactile richness. The corduroy alone already suggests tradition, but then there’s that detail -the strap, embellished with silk fringe- which feels slightly excessive, slightly theatrical, and therefore necessary.

It stops the outfit from becoming too literal. Too “cowboy.” Too expected. So, it’s not about authenticity. It’s about composition. And maybe that’s what makes it feel modern. Not the pieces themselves, but the way they refuse to stay in their original context.

I am currently in a very committed relationship with the Levi’s baggy barrel jeans. They’re loose, effortless, but still hold their shape - almost sculptural, with that subtle balloon curve that makes everything feel considered, even when it isn’t.

But comfort alone is never enough. I needed to disrupt it. So I paired them with the “Death of Leichhardt” dress which is worn not as a dress, but as intention. It reveals just enough at the bust to shift the energy entirely, yet somehow the look never crosses into obvious territory. There’s balance. There’s restraint. And that’s where things get interesting.

This is exactly the line I like to walk: not too conservative, never boring, and always with a trace of something slightly mischievous. The kind of outfit that doesn’t explain itself but also doesn’t need to.

And then, the hat. A baseball cap, because sometimes you need an element that casually denies everything else that’s happening. It pulls the look back just enough, like saying, relax, it’s not that serious, while very much being that serious. It also saves the outfit from looking like I’m on my way to a club at 2am - which, for the record, I’m not. Not today.

When Stella saw me in this outfit, she said I reminded her of Marilyn Manson. And I didn’t argue. Why would I?

“Hey you, what do you see? Something beautiful or something free.”

I think what she really meant is that it echoes something familiar. That teenage instinct to dress like you have something to prove. The difference is that now I don’t. The clothes stayed, the urgency didn’t. There’s something slightly confrontational about this look, but in a quiet way. No theatrics, no effort to impress. Just a suggestion that you might not be entirely approachable, and that’s part of the appeal.

So, when I’m on the run, I refuse to look like it. Comfort is non-negotiable, but so is presence. So I start with my 2WO+1NE=2 T-shirt -reliable, minimal, almost too simple- and then I disrupt it slightly. My mother’s vintage sheer top comes in like a whisper of drama. And then, the jeans. The Levi’s baggy barrel jeans are doing most of the talking here. They hold structure, they create distance, they say “I’ve moved on” without being nostalgic about it. If this were years ago, I would have probably squeezed myself into a pair of skinny jeans, convinced that discomfort was part of the silhouette. Growth, in this case, looks like volume. Space. Breathing room.

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Have a great Easter!

Stella + Alexandra + Valisia

Valisia’s picks

La Morte Amoureuse by Théophile Gautier

A masterpiece. Truly. Gothic writing at its finest. Religion, nightmares, femme fatales, vampires, the quiet suggestion that love might be stronger than death… it has everything, and somehow never feels excessive. Just perfectly lush.

Told in the first person, it follows a young priest, Romuald, who falls -quite disastrously-in love with the enigmatic Clarimonde. From that moment on, reality becomes… flexible. By day, he is a devoted man of God. By night, in his dreams, he belongs entirely to her. What Gautier does so well is capture that feverish state between desire and guilt. The pull between devotion and obsession. Clarimonde is not just a woman, she’s a vision, a temptation, a beautiful threat. Both beauty and the beast, naturally.

It’s eerie, sensual, decadent - and I mean that as a compliment. Every sentence feels lush, almost intoxicated with its own emotion. I loved every word. And yes, I fell for them both. No regrets.

Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie

Yes. You saw this coming. There is always going to be an Agatha Christie moment with me. Even more so when Egypt is involved - I have a weakness.

Everything begins as it should: a luxurious cruise along the Nile, all sun, silk, and quiet displays of wealth. And at the center of it, Linnet Ridgeway- young, beautiful, impeccably dressed, and just slightly too accustomed to having everything. Which is precisely why she ends up dead. Shot, mid-honeymoon, on a boat full of people who absolutely have opinions about her life choices. Including, notably, the husband she recently acquired from her best friend. A detail that does not go unnoticed.

And who happens to be on board? Of course, Hercule Poirot, who is supposedly on holiday. (Poirot on holiday is always suspicious. Someone is definitely going to die.) What follows is pure Christie: misdirection, red herrings, shifting alliances, and that delicious sense that everyone is hiding something. Possibly several things. It’s one of those stories where the scenery is gorgeous, the manners are impeccable, and everyone has a motive. A classic. And one of Poirot’s most satisfying cases.

Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol

The first thing I ever read by Gogol was “Viy”. Obviously. A haunted church, a witch, theological panic -I was right at home. So when I moved on to “Dead Souls”, it felt almost suspiciously… terrestrial. No demons, no levitation, no cursed beauty staring into your soul. And yet, somehow, I loved it just as much.

At the center of it all is Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov, a man with the energy of someone who definitely has a plan and absolutely should not be trusted. He arrives in a small provincial town and starts buying “dead souls”, which, unfortunately, are not poetic metaphors but actual deceased serfs still listed in census records. What follows is a parade of bizarre landowners, each more embarrassing than the last. Gogol observes them with this quiet, almost elegant cruelty. Never loud, never forced, just painfully precise.

So, this is not horror. Not technically. But it is grotesque in its own way, which is probably why it works. Everyone is ridiculous, slightly decayed, faintly tragic, and very, very funny - whether they mean to be or not.

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Stella’s picks

Difficult Death by René Crevel

"All aboard Ratapoilopolis!"

I have a love affair with everything that falls under the “Surrealism” umbrella. I like it even more if it made André Breton mad. In this case it was Surrealism’s sacred ideals versus Communism and Homosexuality.

The novel revolves around the struggles of Pierre Dumont, a young man torn between two figures who embody opposing paths. The first, Diane, is a warm, self-effacing art student who loves Pierre in a way that appears platonic, but carries an undercurrent of desire she wouldn’t resist. Pierre, however, ultimately feels no attraction toward her. The second is Arthur Bruggle, an ambitious yet campy American composer and drifter, with whom Pierre is deeply infatuated. Bruggle, in turn, treats him with indifference, disdain, and at times, cruelty.

Difficult Death is often considered semi-autobiographical in its exploration of emotional anguish, sexuality, and inner turmoil. René Crevel delves into the complex psychological landscape of his protagonist, reflecting his own life, marked by illness, conflicted identity, and his eventual suicide in 1935.

A Very Easy Death by Simone de Beauvoir

Contrary to the book’s title, this is A Very Difficult Read. You can be sure that when something is titled Happiness, Bonheur, Freedom, or Love, you’re in for some of your most heartbreaking hours -if it’s a film- or days, even months, if it’s a book.

Simone de Beauvoir’s masterpiece made me feel the same way I did when watching Michael Haneke’s Amour: devastated and deeply moved, but also left with a renewed respect for people and for life.

The book is a final, day-by-day account of her mother’s death. De Beauvoir’s relationship with her mother, famously documented in her early memoirs, shaped by opposing attitudes toward social expectations, rebellion on one side, conformity on the other. While she rebelled against social expectations, her mother embraced them. She captures the complexity of the mother–daughter bond, a tension between intimacy and distance, resentment and deep admiration. But through this deeply difficult subject, she also reflects on the way women were treated by arrogant doctors, as well as on the socioeconomic realities of France, seen through the acts of kindness of the underpaid and overworked nurses.

My Last Breath by Luis Buñuel

I love cinema, and I love Luis Buñuel—he is one of my favourite directors—so reading his autobiography felt like the natural next step (it’s also the only autobiography I’ve ever read). After reading My Last Breath, he ascended to the pedestal I had been building, brick by brick, with every one of his films.

The book explores many aspects of his life: his friendships with Charlie Chaplin, André Breton, Paul Éluard, and Salvador Dalí; anecdotes from their shared lives; and behind-the-scenes moments from his films. He lived in Spain, Paris, the United States, and Mexico. He is brutally honest—offering his candid opinions on Japanese culture, Dante’s Divine Comedy, and the Marquis de Sade—while also sharing his preferred recipe for a dry martini. The kind of James Bond I would want.

My favourite anecdote of his is a prank he wanted to pull: as a renowned atheist, on his deathbed he would call all his friends and a priest, confess his sins, receive absolution, and then die, just to leave them all wondering.

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Alexandra’s picks

The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy

This novella is a short, sharp confrontation with the one thing most people spend their lives avoiding: the reality of their own death. Tolstoy follows a successful, outwardly respectable judge who has done everything “right,” only to realize (too late) that none of it actually meant anything when faced with his final days.

What makes the book hit is how it dismantles the idea that more success, more comfort, or more recognition will ever be enough; it exposes that hunger as a kind of lifelong distraction. As Ivan’s world shrinks, has nothing to do with status or achievement, but a painful clarity about how he lived and what he ignored. It’s not an easy read (quite the opposite!), but it’s one of those rare works that forces you to reconsider what a “good life” actually is before you run out of time to answer it.

Erotism: Death and Sensuality by Georges Bataille

"Erotism is the affirmation of life, even in death" - Georges Bataille.

A read that deliberately pushes into territory most people would rather avoid. Bataille moves between philosophy, anthropology, and literature to argue that eroticism isn’t just about sex, but about transgression, taboo, and our strange pull toward death itself. He looks at everything from religion and sacrifice to cruelty and desire, suggesting that what we’re really chasing isn’t pleasure in a simple sense, but a kind of loss of boundaries, a moment where the self dissolves.

What’s most interesting is that he doesn’t celebrate total freedom. In fact, he insists that without limits and prohibitions, eroticism loses its intensity altogether. It’s dense, unsettling, and at times extreme. It can reshape how you think about desire; less as something clean or rational, and more as something tangled up with fear, the sacred, and the edge of life itself.

The Malady of Death by Marguerite Duras

This is a haunting, minimalist exploration of emptiness and the human inability to love. In her lyrical, spare style, Marguerite Duras tells the story of a man who hires a woman to teach him to feel, to resurrect him from the social death of isolation and emotional numbness he’s already living. The story moves with intensity, confronting the reader with the idea that death is not only physical but a state of the soul, a life stripped of connection and feeling. In just a few pages, Duras captures the strange tension between longing and impossibility, showing that love is as fragile, elusive, and essential as life itself.

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Happy reading!

Being asked to design for the 2026 edition felt like the perfect challenge.

Our starting point

When you wear a garment, you inherit the imprint of another body. Every fold, every seam traces someone else. Even a custom piece begins before you, shaped by a body that came first. As designers, we always begin somewhere: with a fitting model, a standard size, a body that isn’t our own.

But what if the body itself became the origin? What if each body became its own garment?

That question shaped our approach for the Bacchae project.

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We began with Mnemosyne

Our desire was to preserve the body in this exact moment. This exact shape in time.

In Greek mythology, Mnemosyne is the goddess of memory and the mother of the Muses. Before writing existed, memory was everything. Stories, histories, identities were held in the body, repeated, carried forward.

Because the body is never still. It shifts, ages, transforms. Nothing about it is fixed. And yet, like a photograph capturing light for a fraction of a second, we wanted to hold it, just for a moment, through fabric and thread.

Red came instinctively

Partly, of course, because of the wine. But also because of the Bacchae themselves, as figures of intensity, movement and trance. In The Bacchae of Euripides, they exist in a state of constant motion, somewhere between ecstasy and rupture.

For us, they are energy. They are movement.

That’s something we wanted to carry through the entire project, through the garments and the way they were documented. The campaign images never settle. The body is always in motion.

There’s also sound. Music runs through the installation, looping, interrupting, insisting. It creates a kind of continuous state, a subtle trance that envelops you in slowly.

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The making of

We invited women of different ages, shapes, and backgrounds to take part. Some were close friends, some family, others people we admire; sculptors, scientists, artists, brilliant minds in completely different fields.

A chorus began to form.

Each woman entered a cocoon of red chiffon. We worked slowly, by hand. Thread followed the body. First, the imprint. Then the details that make each person singular: freckles, scars, lines, tattoos.

(We have to admit, it was a lot of fun, even if each tracing took us several hours - and to be more specific SUMMER hours!)

From Behind-the-Scenes to the Forefront

After nine months of dedication, we were ready to bring our artwork into the spotlight at Romantso in downtown Athens, nearly two weeks ago.

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The Event

For us, the Bacchae is a way of thinking about the body today. About female liberation. About identity. About women existing together, as a collective force.

A modern Dionysian chorus: alive, moving, and entirely their own.

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Oh! And also 3 playlists, whatever your mood is.

60’s Garage by Valisia

A Playlist curated by Valisia

Valisia’s Version

It’s no secret that I am a huge fan of everything 80’s, especially the music. New wave, early EBM, new beat, darkwave - my usual suspects. However, I grew up listening to 60’s garage because both my parents were mods. So this is my small act of homage to the music that quietly molded me as a child.

No look referencing the 60’s can exist without a mini skirt. The Κιόνια mini skirt is ideal, with its subtle slit revealing even more leg, not that the legs were hiding to begin with.

I paired it with my mother’s vintage white shirt, complete with a built-in Austin Powers–style scarf situation. On top, an oversized jacket, because for me it’s always about proportion. There is something irresistibly cool about being very feminine underneath and slightly boyish on top.

Stella’s Version

Valisia and I have an unspoken daily race: whoever sets foot in the showroom first, chooses the music for the day. So we either listen to dance, dark electro, or something that sounds like chains dragging across the floor while a wolf howls. You can imagine my surprise when she didn’t select dark electro/italo disco/minimal wave. The girl loves to dance, and she excels at it!

I improvised a lot here. I was thinking of 60’s mods, but instead of form-fitting suits, I went for an oversized one that feels more me. I took a silk scarf (a lovely gift from Armenia from dearest Cengiz), fastened it with a brooch, and made my own “tie”. I love a colour-coordination moment, so that’s why I went with the bottiglia Furlane velvet slippers instead of boots or loafers.

Alexandra’s Version

This entire ‘60s Garage detour began, quite innocently, with a pair of go-go boots (in black). They felt so convincingly sixties that it seemed almost rude not to build a look around them, something that landed somewhere between a garage groupie and… me, but on a particularly referential day.

A mini skirt was a must for that interpretation, so I went for a leather one to tie in with the boots. The top was trickier. I wanted something that suggested effortlessness without actually being effortless (the eternal goal), which is how the ‘Trial’ shirt made the cut. Worn properly, it was fine. Worn almost entirely unbuttoned, it was better, loosely framing a very geometric bra that felt just structured enough to interrupt the whole “I just threw this on” narrative.

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Experimental/Avant-Garde by Stella

A Playlist curated by Stella

Stella’s Version

I don’t know why, but as my boyfriend describes it, I like to listen to harsh “sounds” instead of music. And I agree, I do. I find it exhilarating to really pay attention to a soundscape built by unusual instruments, unexpected uses of familiar ones, repetitive frequencies that evolve into something new, the unfolding of a deeper concept throughout an album, and screams instead of traditional singing. (If you agree with me, you probably already love Παράξενος Ελκυστής.)

So I thought: when the sound is that complex, why complicate things, Stella? And I didn’t. I dressed like I do when I don’t have the headspace to think about what I want to wear but still want to feel like myself. My trusty silk trousers, my loyal crisp white shirt (with a twist), and my never-failing loafers. The crazy hair is a nod to my favourite professionals: mathematicians.

Alexandra’s Version

Sometimes the best experiment is… not to experiment at all! (Or maybe that’s just my instinctive reaction to Stella, who sometimes listens to music that sounds like cars racing, and I can’t tell if she’s really listening or secretly watching Formula 1.)

For this look, I asked myself: what would I wear to an experimental concert? The answer came together naturally. Fully black, fully silk; a maxi, body-hugging dress with an interesting neckline, cinched at the waist with an oversized belt to play with the contrast between soft and hard materials (because we’re talking experimentation, after all). I finished it off with leather boots and sunnies.

Simple, understated, but ready for any avant-garde occasion, where everyone’s in black anyway, so the outfit doesn’t steal attention from the music… well… not entirely, anyway.

Valisia’s Version

Experimental/Avant-Garde. Not exactly my first musical thought when I step into the showroom in the morning - if you know, you know. For me, music is usually about tension, beat, and that irresistible urge to dance. However, every now and then I’m willing to torture myself a little… but obviously with style.

So this is where the more daring outfit appears.

I return to the Κιόνια mini skirt, this time paired with the fitted Καλλονή blouse. I call this combination subtle sensuality. The silhouette follows the body, but the high neck of the blouse keeps everything in balance - composed, almost strict.

Of course, the mini skirt unapologetically reveals the legs. And if the legs are already part of the conversation, a pair of stockings only adds a little extra intrigue.

Because the most interesting kind of sensuality is the one that knows exactly where to stop.

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Post-Punk by Alexandra

A Playlist curated by Alexandra

Truth be told, punk was my favourite genre for years—hardcore, Celtic punk, anarcho-punk—all of it. That was very much my university phase. Then life moved on, and naturally, so did my taste. It all became a bit moodier, darker, more atmospheric… more post-punk. You could say it’s the “adult version” of punk. Punk is instinct, chaos, a shout in the void, “smash everything now!” Post-punk is more like, “we smashed everything… Now what does it all mean?” Same energy, just turned inward, more experimental, more introspective, with those signature basslines, angular guitars, and a sense of alienation running through it.

As Genesis P-Orridge put it perfectly: “Punk is saying ‘fuck you.’ Post-punk is saying ‘I’m fucked.’”

Alexandra’s Version

Stylistically, post-punk couldn’t feel more me if it tried. Historically born as a reaction against the excess of the late ’70s, post-punk fashion stripped things back to minimal, utilitarian lines, blending androgyny with a hint of dystopian futurism. It rejected the gloss and opulence of mainstream fashion as a deliberate pushback against consumerism and mass production.

That’s very much where this look sits. Fully monochrome and sharply tailored (black was the only real option), I kept everything close-cut and structured. The blazer is angular and precise, paired with subtly distressed trousers whose cuff cut-outs echo the segmented peel of an orange. Black sunnies and high-heeled leather ankle boots complete the outfit.

Valisia’s Version

Post-punk, for me, screams sleek, androgynous, monochromatic. It belongs to that world of dim lights and introspective moods. Imagine listening to the atmospheric, melancholic sounds of The Chameleons while wearing something loud, colourful and aggressively maximalist. Impossible. The music simply wouldn’t allow it.

So the base is strict and dark: a pair of black barrel jeans, paired with the (oh no, didn’t see that coming) super oversized Mule Skinner trench coat. Dramatic, slightly severe, exactly how post-punk likes it.

But a look like this needs a small disruption, a moment where the temperature rises slightly. That’s where the sheer Digitaria bodysuit comes in. A quiet provocation under all the structure.

As I always say: keep it effortless, with a splash of sexiness.

Stella’s Version

When I hear “Post-Punk”, I think “live gig”. And I have a uniform for attending one: comfortable black trousers (I very, very, very rarely wear jeans), a warm (in winter)/airy (in summer) top, and my favourite vintage velvet bomber jacket (from a time when vintage meant hidden treasures and not fast fashion from 10 years ago).

Now, you might think that silk trousers, a wool/cashmere blouse, and a velvet jacket don’t exactly scream “easy, laid-back comfort”, but that’s why expensive fabrics are expensive — they deliver in every possible scenario.

Why this particular jacket? For one, I love it — it’s perfect. Secondly, when everyone is expected to wear total black, I like to break the pattern because apparently I’m reactionary. Thirdly, and most importantly, its pockets zip up securely, so I don’t have to think twice about losing my valuables when all I want to do is dance and have a good time.

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Bisous, bisous

Valisia + Stella + Alexandra

Polish artists, influenced by the French, soon began expressing themselves through the same medium.

The first Polish posters appeared in the 1890’s, created by magnificent painters such as Józef Mehoffer, Stanisław Wyspiański, Karol Frycz, Kazimierz Sichulski, and Wojciech Weiss.

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They mostly designed posters related to the arts, announcing exhibitions, theatre, and ballet performances.

Jugendstil, Secession, Japonism, and Cubism were combined with traditional elements of symbolism and national folklore.

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After the end of World War I and Poland’s regained independence in 1918, a rapid process of industrialization began, bringing with it the growing need for advertising—and for producing posters more quickly.

From the intricate posters of the previous century, we now move into a new era. Cubism — a style that freed art from conventional ideas of beauty and ugliness and from the need to imitate nature — became a major influence during this period.

Architects, especially students from the Warsaw University of Technology, were among the most receptive creators of posters at the time. Unlike the painters of the previous generation, they were not burdened by academic conventions and were naturally inclined to apply the rules of geometry to commercial design.

Among these students we find the figure of Tadeusz Gronowski, who helped establish the foundations of the modern Polish poster.

The ‘50s and the early ‘60s mark the Golden Age of Polish posters. Like everything else at the time, the film industry was controlled by the state. Two main institutions were responsible for commissioning poster designs: Film Polski (Polish Film) and Centrala Wynajmu Filmów – CWF (Movie Rentals Central).

Rather than hiring graphic designers, they commissioned artists, each of whom brought a distinct voice to their work. As a result, the Polish Poster School is therefore not stylistically unified, but remarkably diverse.

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At the time, the poster was essentially the only permitted form of individual artistic expression. The state showed little concern for how the posters actually looked. Paradoxically, this state control became something of a blessing in disguise: free from the commercial constraints of a capitalist economy, artists were able to fully explore their creative potential.

This freedom also encouraged the use of metaphor, symbolism, and visual wit, which became defining characteristics of Polish poster design.

What sets Polish posters apart is that they are artist-driven rather than studio-driven. They are closer to fine art than to commercial design. Painterly rather than purely graphic.

Artists requested, and were granted, complete artistic freedom. They created striking imagery inspired by the films without literally depicting them: no star headshots, no film stills, and not necessarily any direct reference to the title.

Iconic Outfits in Film

So the next time you see a movie poster that feels a little too polished, a little too predictable, remember that somewhere along the way Poland decided posters could be strange, symbolic, funny, unsettling and basically, actual art. Hopefully this little tour sparked some inspiration.

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Bibliography: Smashing Magazine

Let’s find out.

Alexandra’s

When it comes to winter, I mostly think in textures. I get weirdly fixated on how fabrics feel, like if it doesn’t make me want to touch my own sleeve all day, I don’t want it. Corduroy, suede, lambskin leather, cashmere. For me, these are the fabrics that make getting dressed feel… satisfying.

#1

The 2WO+1NE=2 Bannockbane coat is already doing a lot; it’s long, it’s imposing, the shoulders are padded, there are gold chain fastenings marching down the front, and the wool-cashmere blend is plush and beautiful. With a coat like that, you don’t dilute the interior, but you meet it where it stands.

Leather makes the most sense here. Slim leather trousers tucked into equally slim, knee-high boots, so streamlined you almost lose track of where one ends and the other begins. It creates a solid, continuous visual bassline at the bottom.

But because this is midday (we’re not storming a punk concert… yet), the severity needs softening. An ecru silk skirt, worn casually (half-buttoned, left to drape loosely over the trousers instead of neatly tucked) interrupts the leather situation in just the right way. The result, I’d say, feels a little late-’90s Ann Demeulemeester.

#2

One corduroy moment is fun. Two is intentional. Three is… this is who I am now.

So obviously the only reasonable next step was to fully commit to that. Head to toe. The skirt = Black corduroy. The hat, also = black corduroy. Both conspiring beautifully with the oversized corduroy 2WO+1NE=2 Holyrood jacket, which in this context stops being “a jacket” and starts feeling more like the top half of a slightly alternative suit that accidentally makes you look very put together.

Whenever things get this fabric-forward, I like to insert a calm anchor. A high-neck, sleeveless, body-skimming black top is the ultimate stabilizer. It works in the morning, it works at dinner, it works while you’re rethinking your entire life between appointments. Chic, simple and emotionally stable.

Then knee-high leather boots peek out from the paneled straps of the 2WO+1NE=2 Inverness skirt, whilst a leather belt pulls everything together, echoing the texture without competing with it.

#3

There’s something very satisfying about matching hems. The 2WO+1NE=2 Holyrood jacket, is short-ish and boxy, so it only felt fair to give it a playsuit that hits at almost the same place. When you’re dealing with skirts or shorts, that alignment matters more than people admit.

Because the jacket is oversized, showing some leg keeps the whole thing from feeling swallowed. It’s volume up top, clarity at the bottom.

The texture mix (suede, corduroy, leather) make a very simple look feel layered. And when the jacket is buttoned, the playsuit dissolves beneath it, transforming the whole look into a compact, cold-weather mini dress.

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Valisia’s

#1

This outfit is a clear homage to my mother’s aesthetic. She was always experimenting - unapologetically so - leaning toward the eccentric, flirting with the flamboyant. She didn’t “tone things down.” She turned them up. Inevitably, that molded me.

When I wear this, I see her.

There’s something distinctly 80’s editorial about it, the kind you’d find in old glossy magazines where the model looked slightly unapproachable and possibly late for a gallery opening. A large cordovan hat, unapologetic in scale. A black cape wrapped around me, dramatic but controlled. Yes, there’s a hint of Zorro but make it fashion. Less sword, more silhouette. A small detail: both pieces belonged to my mother.

Everything is black, head to toe. Severe, almost monastic. And then, the interruption. The flashes of gold from the chain fastenings on the Bannockbane coat. They catch the light in the most deliberate way, breaking the darkness just enough. Not decoration. Punctuation.

It’s powerful, slightly theatrical, and entirely inherited.

#2

For this outfit, I wanted to soften things. To romanticize (blame the current Wuthering Heights mania) the structure and severity of the Bannockbane coat.

So, the solution was lingerie as outerwear. Enter my mother’s nightgown. Smooth silk, fluid and cool against the skin, with just the right amount of lace - delicate, but not fragile. It carries that quiet intimacy vintage pieces have, the kind that feels almost cinematic.

If I could change one thing, I would add a dramatic slit. Just enough to reveal a flash of leg while walking. But we can’t have everything, can we?

So, to disrupt the innocence, to introduce a note of tension, I cinched it with the Aumorfia “Tirante Harness”, worn as a belt with garters. Suddenly the nightgown isn’t so prude. It’s conflicted. Romantic, yes, but aware.

Softness held in place by intention.

#3

This outfit is nothing revolutionary for me. It’s practically my uniform. My default setting. A mini umbrella skirt - because I believe my legs are my best asset, and it would be almost irresponsible not to let them exist publicly. The silhouette is playful but precise; it moves when I move, which is exactly the kind of loyalty I expect from a garment.

On top, a fitted cropped piece from the Los Angeles collection, with leg-of-mutton sleeves (my eternal weakness). Not the theatrical, costume-department version. Just enough volume to carry a quiet morning into a slightly dramatic evening.

And then, of course, the oversized corduroy Holyrood jacket. I will always choose oversized. It’s cool, yes, but more importantly, it’s dominant. It creates structure around the softness, authority around the flirtation. It says, “Yes, there is a mini skirt under here. And yes, I am in control of it.”

This is not an outfit that tries. It knows.

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Stella’s

Too much sun, I know.

Why wear 1 jacket, when you can wear 2?

I can feel it in the air — my days of plenty are numbered. The days of wearing blazers under my coat, layering two blazers together and even throwing a shawl over them. The Πύργος blazer is perfect for that. Its shape is inspired by marbles sewn together, creating all those cut-outs. I often use it as a layering piece to add extra texture to an all-black outfit. Here, I’m embracing those in-between days — still winter, but with a touch of off-white in the mix.

I love this coat because it does all the accessorising for you. When open, gold chains create their own patterns as you move; when closed, it forms an abstract tartan-like pattern. I picked up on that with the gold elements in my shoes (my favourite shoes of all time).

Raven black + crow black

When you wear a lot of black, you start noticing its hundreds of tints: coal black, obsidian black, crow black, raven black, asphalt black — you name it. So what I did here was create a “suit” in obsidian black (bermuda shorts and cape) and add a layer of crow black (in corduroy, no less) in between, for good measure. And of course, carbon black for my shoes.

Again, I love jackets that add texture and extra elements to an outfit, while also working beautifully as layering pieces.

I’ve just added a thick gold choker, minimal enough not to overpower the outfit, but substantial enough to elevate it.

The one-layer winter outfit

There is only one thing that is superior about summer dressing compared to winter dressing: when you’re too bored to think, too hot, or in a hurry but still want to look presentable, you can just throw on a summer dress and go.

So, I solved that. During the winter months, you usually need at least two layers. Well, unless you’re using your coat as a dress. It works because this coat is embellished, collarless, and has a sleek, slim silhouette. And you’ll never be cold wearing it as your only layer.

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Bisous, bisous

Alexandra + Valisia + Stella

And yet, lately, they’ve returned with particular determination. With Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu and Luc Besson’s Dracula, it feels like the undead have once again risen to conquer our dreams. Not politely. Not subtly. Dramatically.

Every generation rediscovers the vampire. But each time, the silhouette changes.

From the elongated shadow of Count Orlok to the aristocratic sensuality of Count Dracula, from Victorian mourning lace to ‘90s velvet excess, the vampire has always been as much about costume as about curse.

Because what is a vampire, really, if not a masterclass in image control? They understand the power of a cape. The importance of a high collar. The erotic tension of a cinched waist. They know that immortality is one thing - but immortality in the right fabric? That’s legacy.

So, let’s summon the most iconic vampire looks ever to haunt the screen.

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Black Sunday (1960) by Mario Bava

Before vampires were cool, they were terrifying.

Barbara Steele’s dual performance as Katia and Asa is pure operatic horror. Asa, in particular with her severe dark gowns, sharp veils, and that impossibly sculpted face - looks like she was carved from marble and malice. The costumes lean heavily into baroque decay: corseted bodices, heavy fabrics, religious undertones. Nothing casual. Everything fatal.

Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970) by Vítězslav Nezval

Pale, melancholic, and dangerously pretty.

With its Pre-Raphaelite framing and washed-out, storybook palette, this film feels like it was made to be endlessly reblogged. Valerie drifts through scenes in nightgown-sundress hybrids, delicate ribbons, and magical earrings that look stolen from a Victorian jewelry box. At the same time, her grandmother’s sheer black gloves and ropes of pearls add a decadent rot beneath the innocence.

It’s less about seduction, more about atmosphere. Vampirism here is lace, ritual, and girlhood on the brink.

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Daughters of Darkness (1971) by Harry Kümel

Aristocracy Never Dies.

Delphine Seyrig does not enter a room. She occupies it. With her perfectly sculpted 1930’s waves, controlled voice, and those immaculate gowns by couturier Bernard Perris, she embodies a kind of eternal, continental elegance. Silk, satin, gloves. Everything whispers old money and older secrets.

This is the vampire as European socialite. You don’t run from her. You RSVP.

Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) by Werner Herzog

This is not the grotesque horror of the 1922 original. This is yearning.

Isabelle Adjani drifts through the film in high-necked, diaphanous white gowns that feel almost bridal, almost devotional. The silhouettes are late-19th-century pure, puffed sleeves, delicate pleats, soft movement. She looks less like a victim and more like a saint awaiting sacrifice.

Opposite her, Klaus Kinski’s bald, rat-like Nosferatu is all elongated shadow and funereal black. However, it’s Adjani’s fragile luminosity that defines the film’s aesthetic. Her white against his darkness. Innocence against rot.

The Hunger (1983) by Tony Scott

Yes, we’ve spoken about it before. And yes, it would be blasphemy to exclude it.

The opening alone is iconic: Peter Murphy in a cage while Bauhaus perform Bela Lugosi’s Dead. Catherine Deneuve appears in silver cat-eye sunglasses, leather air-cadet cap, blade-shaped earrings, studded gloves - and only escalates from there. Impeccable tailoring. Cold glamour. Controlled sensuality. And David Bowie? Cream suits, oversized coats, decadent scarves.

This film didn’t just dress vampires. It defined 80’s goth chic.

Iconic Outfits in Film

Vamp (1986) by Richard Wenk

Let’s be honest. The plot is not why we’re here.We’re here for Grace Jones. Playing a vampire queen who moonlights as a stripper, she turns every scene into a living art installation.

Her Keith Haring-designed costumes are outrageous in the best way: psychedelic catsuit with whiteface and red wig, sculptural metal spiral bra, Afrofuturistic headdress that looks like it could summon lightning.

It’s camp. It’s theatrical. It’s fearless. She doesn’t just steal the film. She devours it.

The Lost Boys (1987) by Joel Schumacher

Quintessential 80’s? Yes. But elevated.

Kiefer Sutherland’s David looks like he just left a cyber punk club and decided to start a cult. The peroxide spiked mullet. The floor-length double-breasted black coat. Leather gloves. One dangling earring. Maximum DGAF energy. This is when the vampire stopped being aristocratic and became dangerously cool.

Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992) by Francis Ford Coppola

What can we say? Everything is excessive. Everything is correct.

Costume designer Eiko Ishioka was given total freedom, and she responded with art history on acid.

Dracula’s red muscle armor alone deserves its own exhibition. It’s anatomical, romantic, grotesque. And Lucy’s dramatic white lace gown? Pure bridal hysteria. Voluminous, translucent, almost absurd in its innocence before corruption.

This isn’t styling. It’s spectacle.

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The Addiction (1995) by Abel Ferrara

Black and white. New York. Existential dread. Here, vampirism is stripped down to 90’s intellectual chic: long dark coats, simple silhouettes, severe hair, and a hell of a pair of sunglasses. Nothing ornate. Nothing theatrical. Just urban detachment.

It feels like a philosophy student discovered Helmut Lang and nihilism at the same time. And honestly? It works.

Blade (1998) by Stephen Norrington

The tactical vest alone could walk a Prada runway.

Paired with a floor-length leather coat, industrial belt, and Matrix-style sunglasses, Blade’s silhouette became the blueprint for late-90’s cyber minimalism. Functional. Aggressive. Clean.

The nightclub bloodbath scene? Still one of the most stylish openings in vampire cinema.

Every trend-savvy human trying to look “dark but practical” owes him royalties.

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After the Second World War and the Greek Civil War, Greece sought to recover and rebuild, turning to what it had already been oriented toward since the early 20th century: tourism. Thus, following the end of the Greek Civil War and with financial assistance from the Americans (through the Marshall Plan), the Greek National Tourism Organisation (GNTO) was re-established in 1951 (its original foundation dates back to 1929).

This marks the first—or early—phase of the initially pilot Xenia Programme, which would last until 1957, with Charalambos Sfaellos serving as Director of the Technical Service. The Organisation’s first initiative was the construction of four guesthouses in distinctive locations across the country. These locations, however, had to meet two requirements: the promotion of the surrounding historic environment and the immediate generation of revenue in order to further finance the programme.

The sites proposed by the GNTO were: Delphi (study by D. Pikionis), Mykonos (known as “Hotel Leto,” study by Pr. Vasileiadis), Nafplio (study by Kl. Krantonellis), and Kastoria (initial study by Ch. Sfaellos and Marika Zagorisiou), each selected for different reasons.

The second phase of the programme—during which it was established that all buildings would uniformly bear the name Xenia—began in 1957 and lasted until 1967. During this period, the architect Aris Konstantinidis served as Head of the Studies Department. In July 1967, he resigned from the Service in reaction to the coup d’état of 21 April and the establishment of the military junta.

The name of the “Xenia” Programme clearly derives from the epithet “Xenios Zeus,” attributed to Zeus, the supreme god of the ancient Greek pantheon. Zeus was the protector of strangers at a time when hospitality was considered a moral duty and the foreign guest was regarded as sacred. The word “Xenia” is grammatically feminine in Greek; thus, in the plural they are referred to as “the Xenias”.

Initially, each hotel of the Organisation had its own distinct name. The place of installation was, in principle, the source from which the hotel derived its name. Myths, local heroes, particular landscape or climatic features (lakes, mountains, winds), and toponyms constituted the reservoir from which characteristic names were drawn. Thus, the first hotels were named “Leto” in Mykonos, “Delphi” in the homonymous area, “Amphitryon” in Nafplio, “Alkyon” in Thasos, “Limni” in Kastoria, and “Artemis” for the guesthouse on Delos. Konstantinidis’ first hotel in Andros (1958) was named “Triton.”

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From 1959 onward, and alongside the spread of Abstract Expressionism in the arts—where painters such as Pollock and Rothko liberated themselves from the necessity of literal representation and extended this logic to the naming of their works (I, II, and so forth)—Aris Konstantinidis adopted a similar approach. He began naming the hotels simply “Xenia,” followed by the respective toponym.

A fundamental prerequisite and starting point of each project was the privileged location of the Xenia to be erected. Konstantinidis ensured that each building harmonised with its surrounding environment and landscape, while also employing local materials.

The colours used were the so-called Polygnotian palette (deep red, ochre, white, and black).

A key characteristic of the Xenia hotels was the absence of differentiation among the rooms. All were equal in status and designed to offer the same view and identical amenities.

The remaining buildings have been designated as preserved monuments of modern heritage status, owing to the uniqueness of their post-war modernist architecture.

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Good news! You can still stay at a Xenia (designed by Nikos Valsamakis, no less) that remains almost untouched: the Amalia Hotel at Delphi.

Although it was a privately owned hotel and not a state-owned one, it’s still a Xenia and it remains largely unchanged to this day. In fact, it is the only operating Xenia that has not undergone an insensitive “modern” renovation.

The best part of our visit was that, during breakfast on a random weekday in December (while we were almost alone at the hotel) the soundtrack was the Twin Peaks theme by Angelo Badalamenti. I don’t know who curated the playlist, but whoever you are, I see you.

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Bibliography:

“Πρόγραμμα Ξενία: Ονομασία, μελέτες + κατασκευές, τυπολογία & κατάλογοι έργων” by Myrianthe Moussa

Archetype.gr

Archival Photos by:

Doma Archi

pbs.twimg.com

As a result, everyone has dinner plans. That part is covered.

The question is what to do with the rest of the day. We’re usually in and around the city centre, so we mapped out an itinerary we actually follow. It’s ideal for this Thursday, but flexible enough for any other day you find yourself wandering Athens. And if dinner somehow isn’t booked yet, don’t worry, we handled that too.

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9:17

Outfit for half of your day

9:43

Morning coffee at Foyer

The perfect starting point to fuel up for your full day ahead. Full not with work, but with activities.

10:22

“From Monet to Warhol”

at B&E Goulandris Foundation

83 masterpieces by 45 leading figures of modern and contemporary art form a unique visual panorama encompassing more than 12 artistic movements. Through a compelling dialogue between works, the exhibition retraces the history of painting from Impressionism to the present day.

A rare opportunity to see, gathered together, key works that marked the most pivotal moments in art over the past 130 years, spanning from Impressionism to Pop Art, with intermediate movements including Post-Impressionism, Fauvism, Expressionism, Cubism, Abstraction and Surrealism.

13:31

Lunch at Leloudas

It’s Tsiknopempti. The whole city (and the country to be exact) smells like a giant BBQ. Head over to Leloudas in Votanikos for an unfussy, simple, perfect lunch. A taverna exactly as it should be —and has been for 98 years. If you’re lucky enough, you’ll end up singing rebetika along with the taverna’s regulars.

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- Time for an outfit change to continue your day refreshed -

You want to be polished but also comfortable and warm.

16:06

Tea at To Tsai

A completely soothing space where you can try one (or two, or three) teas from around the world. And make the right choice about which ones to take home with you.

17:44

“Soft, Sharp and Hollow, Like their Breath”

by Marianna Ignataki at CAN Christina Androulidaki Gallery

Using watercolor, drawing, painting and sculptural installations, Marianna lgnataki creates characters outside of boundaries, frames and identities, in a surrealistic universe. Her work ranges from minimalist scenes and portraits to exaggerated, kitschy, rococo inspired compositions. The influences of her personal journey in Greece, China and Germany and the borrowing of anthropological elements from all three of these cultures are evident in all of her visual depictions, emphasizing that horror, fear and “monsters” are the same everywhere and unite us all.

P.S:

Photo from the presentation we did for our 上海市 (Shanghai) collection in collaboration with Marianna Ignataki.

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19:37

Early dinner at Mirlo Kebabs

Yes, everyone will be at a taverna for dinner, but you already did that for lunch. Now it’s time to have the best kebab we‘ve ever had. Still in the spirit of the day.

21:00

Dracula at Cinobo Patision

But also check their movie schedule, the choices are quite interesting. We will also go back for Belladonna of Sadness (1973).

23:43

End your night at Alexandrino

For the perfect end-of-day cocktail.

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You are free to go!

Bisous!