The renovated Arsakeio Arcade on Stadiou Street is set to become a new leisure and gastronomy destination, helping revive a once-thriving but long-neglected part of central Athens. [AMNA]
The opening of a new era for the Arsakeio Arcade (Stoa Arsakeiou) on Stadiou Street marks a paradigm shift in what was once the heart of commercial Athens. It is a transformation that can be difficult to explain to today’s 20- and 30-somethings. The images of the flooded sidewalks of “Hafteia,” at the junction of Stadiou, Aiolou and Panepistimiou streets, belong to an almost museum-like version of the city – a time when the great “temples” of consumption built in the postwar era by a generation of ambitious entrepreneurs were still thriving, most of whom had started from nothing.
The new destination, branded as Stoa, presents itself as a multifaceted hub for leisure and retail, with a strong focus on Mediterranean gastronomy. A carefully curated mix of restaurants, cafes and bars will now shape the outward-facing identity of one of Athens’ historic buildings, with the hope of attracting visitors and residents who had long avoided the area below Klafthmonos Square and reviving what had become an essentially lifeless zone stretching toward Omonia Square.
