P. Goritsa "Maisonette" Complex

Mavromichali & Athanasiou Diakou Sts, Filothei, 1972-75

Architect
Anastasia E. Tzakou (1928-)



This building was designed by Anastasia Tzakou, architect and NTUA professor, the only woman of the 1960s generation who became distinguished for her constructed and theoretical work. With its simple good taste and organic integration into the environment of the luxury garden city, the building is one of the first notable applications of the new duplex (i.e. an apartment on more than one floor) building type.
It was built in the rocky region of Filothei, on a corner lot on a steep incline. The design proposed, instead of an ordinary apartment building, the duplex system that offered the inhabitants privacy, an individual entrance, and a private garden in front of each home. The apartments are positioned in steps, following the slope of the terrain. The landscaping of the gardens is likewise stepped.
The entrances to the apartments are on their second level, on which are the living and dining rooms and service areas. The first level is the basement on the entrance side, while on the garden side it is a semi-basement, owing to the slope and opens onto the garden. On this level are the service areas for each apartment and a large play area. The third level contains the bedrooms and in two of the houses there is a fourth level with a studio-guest room.
The total is a synthesis of simple cubic volumes. The treatment of the façades is plain, the prevailing features being the balconies with the large openings on the side of the view.

TRANSPORTATION