Are some you readers venerable enough to remember 1960? In the Theoxenia Hotel in Messolonghi, Greece, 1960 is alive and well and wants you back! It is a stunning (or bizarre) example of mid-century aesthetic. The public areas have been beautifully preserved, like a time capsule of 1960s decorating, art, stonework, and furnishings.
Background
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| The Messolonghi Lagoon (from Avramidis et al., 2017) |
The Theoxenia hotel is situated on a peninsula south of the western Greek city of Messolonghi. Messolonghi is off the usual tourist routes, and the city has limited hotels and restaurants. The extensive lagoons and marshes that surround the city serve as fish ponds, wildlife habitat, and salt production ponds.
The city is famous in Greek revolution history. Lord Byron and his “International” Brigade of Philellines landed in Messolonghi in February 1824. Lord Byron died there of malaria on 19 April 1824 (Tsiamis, et al., 2015). This was probably a relapse based on much earlier infections. However, other historians believe his death may have been caused by neurosyphilis (Mellor, 2006).
Malaria was finally eradicated from Greece in the post war era when the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) introduced dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) spraying on a nationwide scale. Greece became UNRRA's largest DDT malaria program (Gardikas, 2008).
Xenia Hotels
The Theoxenia hotel was part of the ambitious Xenia hotel program in the late-1950s and 1960s.
When Greece emerged from the civil war in 1949, its infrastructure and road network was shattered. Hotels of any quality only existed in the major cities and at a few popular tourist sites, like Delphi and Olympia. After the war, it was clear that Greece would never be a heavy industry nation, like the Northern European countries. Therefore, tourism would need to be the economic engine to pull Greece out of poverty. The Greek National Tourism Organization (GNTO) was re-established in 1951 and undertook the task of constructing the country’s tourist infrastructure (Fotopoulou, Monacelli, and Ferrante, 2022). Some of the staff were notable young architects, many of whom were graduates of the National Technical University of Athens. The Xenia program developed a special aesthetic identity or brand image. As a result, you could immediately identify one of the Xenia hotels when you entered a new town.
The hotels were often examples of striking mid-century architecture, with bold horizontal lines and minimal traditional exterior decorative elements. They were often situated in locations of great natural beauty or near significant archaeological remains. However, even at the time, people criticized the fact that a mid-century modern concrete building might be placed in or near a traditional Greek village with its small cottages and their centuries-old clay tile roofs. The Xenias often stood out, although, in some areas, they were designed to organically blend into the topography. (Yes, some of them were just plain ugly.)
Because of budget considerations and aesthetic design, staying in a Xenia was a modest experience. They did not offer the luxury of the big city hotels. Sometimes they had shared bathrooms and lacked central air conditioning, and an Xenia rarely had a swimming pool.
My wife and I remember staying in Xenia hotels in the 1970s and 1980s. By then, they were tired and poorly run. I do not know if they were owned and operated by the GNTO or by private operators. We remember echoey and drafty central halls. They were smelly because people smoked inside. You needed to find out when hot water would be available. The bathrooms were designed to spray water everywhere during a shower because typically there was no enclosure shower curtain.
The breakfasts were dismal affairs of stale white bread, a piece of pound cake, Nescafe (truly, that grotesque instant coffee), and an orange drink similar to our Tang. And this in a country renouned for its bakeries and excellent fruits! The breakfast must have been rigidly specified (x calories, y grams of carbohydrates, etc) because you received it uniformly at Xenias.
By the late 1970s, Xenias became known as hotels to avoid. The program did not adapt to the era of mass tourism, and they were too basic to serve as boutique hotels. The discredited program finally ended in 1983. The GNTO sold or leased some of the hotels, but some are still state property, often in poor condition. Some buildings have been torn down, others abandoned and vandalized. An ignoble fate for a pioneering and ambitious program.
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| Messolonghi Xenia, early 1960 (original photographer unknown; from newmoney) |
Theoxenia of Messolonghi
This has been a long introduction to the background of this Xenia. We were a bit apprehensive to book a room at an Xenia ("What, one of those?"). Not to worry in this case. The building and grounds looked well maintained. The rooms in the newer hall had been revitalized and overhauled. Our room was comfortable, if not luxurious.
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| Mid-century architecture, looks OK in the afternoon sun |
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| Playing card terrazzo flooring? |
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| The spade floor motif extends into the main hall |
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| Restaurant view of the lagoon in the distance |
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| Mid-century furnishings? (Not these ones.) |
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| Wow, a Baroque couch and marble table |
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| Glass dangle lamps and a bouncy stair. Peach color wall? |
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| Palm trees, bougainvillea, and AstroTurf - good stuff |
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| The architect, Ioannis Triantafyllidis |
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| Original art, with a tropical peasant-worker motif |
Now for the real test, how was the room? 1960? Hot water available? Clean?
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| It's not 1960, but what is it? |
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| Flying saucer lamps? |
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| Checking out the marble walls |
Summary
We were pleased. The Theoxenia in Messolonghi was refreshed, clean, quiet, and pretty nice. The bathroom was decent, bedding immaculately clean. The breakfast buffet was ample, if not luxurious, and the cook asked us how we like our eggs. I have seen Xenias in other towns that looked abandoned, so it is good that at least this one in Messolonghi is operating.
Notes:
Avramidis, P., Nikolaou, K., Poulos, K., Bekiari, V., and Vantarakis, A., 2017. Environmental characterization of a Mediterranean protected shallow brackish coastal aquatic system, Klisova Lagoon, Western Greece: a case study, Journal of Coastal Conservation, Vol 21(1), pp. 115-125.
Fotopoulou, A., Monacelli, A., and Ferrante, A., 2022. Post-war Modernism in Greece: The “XENIA” Construction Program for an Architecture of Tourism During the 50s–60s. 10.1007/978-3-030-76239-1_36, in Digital Modernism Heritage Lexicon (pp.853-867)
Gardikas, K., 2008. Relief Work and Malaria in Greece, 1943-1947. Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 43, No. 3, Relief in the Aftermath of War (Jul., 2008), pp. 493-508.
Mellor D., 2006. Was Byron’s terminal illness a form of neurosyphilis? Byron Journal, Vol 34, pp. 127-132
Tsiamis Costas, Piperaki Evangelia-Theophano, Kalantzis George, Poulakou-Rebelakou Effie, Tompros Nikolaos, Thalassinou Eleni, Spiliopoulou Chara, Tsakris Athanassios, 2015. Lord Byron's death: a case of late malarial relapse? Le Infezioni in Medicina, n. 3, 288-295
