Positioned on a narrow stone-paved alley in Plaka, one of Athens’ oldest and most atmospheric neighbourhoods, architecture studio Local Local has completed the renovation of a listed neoclassical townhouse dating back to the 1800s.
Completed over six months, Plaka House reflects the architects’ site-sensitive design ethos. Rather than impose a style, Local Local listens closely to the architecture and geographical nuances of the site, drawing out character through material choices and calibrated interventions. Sitting beneath the Acropolis, the house is enclosed within a rich architectural tapestry, surrounded by 19th-century neoclassical façades, Ottoman-era balconies, and Byzantine and Roman remnants.
Originally renovated by previous owners in the 1990s, the house remained structurally sound but stylistically outdated, defined by glossy marbles, heavy wood finishes, and an aesthetic that jarred with both the building’s heritage and the surrounding urban fabric. Local Local approached the project as an opportunity to reconnect the home with its setting through a contemporary lens, bringing sensitivity, lightness, and calm to the interiors while respecting the constraints of its listed status.
The house spans two levels, with communal areas, including a kitchen, living room, family room, office, and courtyard on the ground floor, and bedrooms, a guest room, and staff quarters above. By pruning overgrown trees and repainting the courtyard walls, Local Local transformed the garden into a light-filled extension of the living space. A rooftop terrace offers sweeping views of the Acropolis and the layered rooftops of Athens. The vision centred on creating a bright, open family home within the thick stone walls of the original structure which provide excellent natural insulation. Natural light was a key challenge, with limited window openings typical of the era. To address this, the studio opted for an almost entirely white, monochromatic palette across walls, ceilings, and joinery, enhancing brightness and spatial cohesion.
Complementing this, the ground-level flooring was entirely resurfaced in terrazzo, a material long associated with Athenian interiors. In the living room, the bold red terrazzo makes a vivid statement, bringing warmth and contrast to the muted envelope. The kitchen and bathrooms feature a lighter terrazzo with a soft grey hue to reflect light in the more compact spaces. Upstairs, the flooring was replaced with light grey solid oak to unify the private rooms with a more contemporary material expression.
Across the home, every detail has been crafted with care and a connection to local artisanship. A local carpenter produced bespoke bookshelf units, radiator covers, skirting, and other joinery that draw from classical forms while adapting to modern needs. The existing dark wooden staircase was painted a soft grey to bring a fresher, more youthful tone to the vertical circulation, and custom storage was added underneath to make use of every inch. The fireplace in the living room was rebuilt using green marble from the island of Tinos, acting as a new hearth that adds depth and character while nodding to traditional Greek materials.
In the kitchen, Local Local retained much of the original layout but reinterpreted it through colour and craft. Cornices and cupboard curtains were added, and much like the rest of the house, personality was introduced through furniture, including a custom-designed green-hued table and bold red chairs, both by the studio. Throughout the project, the studio preserved original features such as wrought-iron exterior details and wooden panelled doors with marble jambs, repainting them in neutral tones to unify the exterior and interior aesthetic.
Plaka House is an example of how Local Local investigates the cultural and material context of a site to actively inform architectural decisions. Though preservation regulations limited major structural interventions, by restoring traditional elements and using locally inspired materials and patterns, the renovation subtly improved the building’s liveability.
Sofia Xanthakou, Director, Local Local, said:
‘As a listed townhouse in one of Athens’ most historic neighbourhoods, Plaka House was deeply informed by its surroundings. With a layered heritage and proximity to the Acropolis, we worked to reconnect the home to its context through a lighter, more open interior expression, respecting its historic character while introducing contemporary and playful gestures that invite light, warmth and everyday family life back into the home.’
About Local Local
Local Local is a boutique architecture practice, designing and transforming buildings and objects that are sensitive to their context. With every new project, Local Local leans into the cultural, social, and geographical nuances of the site, with an intention to listen closely to the philosophy of each place. Locality thus acts as the methodological core of the studio’s design process, incorporating the details, materials, scales, communities, the landscape, and the intangible aura of place into the buildings and objects it creates.
Local Local takes nuanced cues from this context and actively reinterprets them to make bold architectural decisions. With a dedication to the experience and sensoriality of an architecture that feels intimate and grounded in its surroundings, the studio follows a holistic approach, both inside and out, from conceptualisation and design to supervision and detailing. Local Local was founded in 2022 by architect Sofia Xanthakou and has completed several residential and cultural projects in Athens and London.
Project credits
Location Plaka, Athens, Greece
Architect / Interior Design Local Local
Photographer Lorenzo Zandri
