A part of a 30-strong, privately owned hotel group, the Palace Athena is one of the quirkiest and most charming hotels we have ever stayed in.
At the beginning, there was a family home on Crete, which grew into an organic farm and a hospitality business. Today, all the hotels in the group, scattered between Athens and the Greek islands, use produce and cosmetic products from the expanded farming estate.
Breakfast at the Palace Athena is taken on a shaded terrace, as is the case with all Athens hotels that are fortunate enough to have a bit of outside space. A buffet breakfast with a difference, this one: packed with fresh fruit, farm-produced honeys, jams and cheeses, it is one of the most elegant, as well as deliciously healthy you are ever likely to enjoy.
You would get a sense of the quirkiness the moment you enter the somewhat unprepossessing building in …. (address/area) which, as visitors know is at the very heart of the city.
Coloured cow hides, taxidermied animals (apparently, a signature of the hotels within the group), artily upholstered sofas and chairs, contemporary sculptures and various unusual pieces all convey the feeling of a collector’s home.
By the time you get to your room or suite (and the hotel has an unusually high number of suites), you KNOW the owner is a collector. Original graffiti art gives each suite a different theme and family suites have nursery style bedrooms that are a fairy tale come true, complete with sofa beds and floor to ceiling paintings of children’s stories’ characters.
An added touch of Cretan hospitality are the welcome trays of petits fours and the faultless service.
We also enjoyed a deep coloured rose wine from the family farm, made of a pre-phyloxerra grape (name?), perfectly chilled and delicious, accompanied by a selection of Greek cheeses that reminded us that Greece produces a great deal more than the ubiquitous feta.
If you like your boutique hotel pristine and highly personalised, this is absolutely the place for you.
GR-10551, Kotzia sq.,
Athens, Greece
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