EGN NEWS DESK
When friends arrived on the Mouki Mou retailer in Athens at 6 p.m. on the final weekend in May, they grabbed cool glasses of Greek rosé earlier than retreating into the concrete-clad boutique. Its founder, Maria Lemos, who grew up in Greece, opened the store within the metropolis’s historic middle, Plaka, in 2023, ten years after establishing Mouki Mou’s flagship on London’s Chiltern Street. In each locations, she curates a roster of under-the-radar clothes and homeware manufacturers that middle craftsmanship with a tactile, wabi-sabi method. On this explicit night, the model in focus was Dosa, based by the American-based Korean designer Christina Kim, 67, in 1983. The label is understood for its roomy garments in pure, hand-woven materials that nod to workwear akin to shepherd jackets, kurtas (lengthy, unfastened shirts widespread in Pakistan), cossack tops and dashikis (boxy tops worn in West Africa), in addition to its no-waste method to manufacturing.
In addition to showcasing Kim’s newest assortment of garments, Lemos, 59, who can be the founding father of the London-based public relations company Rainbowave, commissioned Kim to design an artwork set up. The work, titled “Shades of White / Whisper of Gold,” is a curtain of delicate gold leaves created in collaboration with the Oaxacan paper-making co-op El Taller Arte Papel. Each paper kind was made utilizing the impression of a bay leaf collected from a tree exterior the co-op’s workshop, then embedded with wire and coloured by hand with gold pencil and spray paint. “For me, white and gold imply Greece,” she says. “It’s the Greek mild, and all these whitewashed villages.”
As the temperature dropped, friends wound their means up two flights of stairs to the U-shaped roof terrace which was planted with verbena, oregano, jasmine, thyme and miniature pomegranate bushes. On their means, they took within the new Dosa assortment, organized on the shop’s second ground and composed of gauzy kaftan attire, delicate camisoles, unfastened pants and shawls, all in creamy hues with orange and golden accents. Shoes with gold leaf motifs by the Athens-based firm Ancient Greek Sandals and 18-karat gold rings and pendants with roughly hewn crystals by the London-based designer Pippa Small have been additionally on show, made particularly to coincide with the collaboration. Once exterior, attendees may see the acropolis on the hill above because the sound of musicians enjoying Athenian and Ionian kantades, or love songs, drifted throughout the roof backyard and into the night time.
The attendees: Friends and collaborators of Lemos’s got here from many corners of the world: Kim, 67, flew in from Los Angeles; Jon, 65, and Tiina Rosen, 60, of Tiina the Store, the not too long ago shuttered minimalist clothes and design boutique in Amagansett, came visiting from New York. Other attendees included the British actress and producer Daisy Bates, 50; the Ancient Greek Sandals founder and designer Christina Martini, 47; the Italian artist Paolo Colombo, 75; the inside designer Leda Athanasopoulou, 33, who designed each the shop and Pagostas, the visitor home Lemos and her husband, Gregoris Kambouroglou, 61, opened in Patmos in 2022; and Tina Daskalondonaki, 50, the curator of Athens’s Museum of Cycladic Art.
The desk: Servers clad in uniforms by the Danish bedding and sleep put on model Tekla wove between all three ranges of the property, proffering massive white bowls of fennel and phyllo pies and golden-crusted fried zucchini flowers full of rice, however there was additionally a heaving desk on the east aspect of the terrace, from which friends may assist themselves to meals. An oatmeal-colored linen tablecloth by the Venice-based material designer Chiarastella Cattana shaped a backdrop for grey and white earthenware dishes by the Danish father-son designer duo Ok H Würtz. A hammered copper bowl full of floating marigold heads made for a press release centerpiece.
The meals: Working with the Athenian catering firm Dipnosofistirion, which focuses on basic Greek fare, Lemos sought to have a good time what she calls the nation’s “gilded historic previous — conserving the whole lot easy and striving for philoxenia, a love of 1’s visitor.” Food and drink have been served on each ground to maintain everybody satiated always. Street vendor-style brown paper cornets have been full of shelled pistachios from Aegina “as a result of they’re such an historic type of meals in Greece,” says Lemos; slices of olive bread got here from Tromero Paidi, Lemos’s favourite bakery in Athens; miniature dolmades (vine leaves full of dill, parsley, spices and rice) have been made on the island of Kasos. In a break from custom, there have been bite-size madeleines studded with poppy seeds for dessert, together with bowls of cherries and apricots, in addition to candied pistachios from the 96-year-old Athenian confectionary Aristokratikon.
The drinks: Guests have been greeted by copper carafes of Magoutes rosé, a mix of 80 p.c Xinomavro grapes and 20 p.c uncommon black Moschomavro grapes, all grown about 2,600 ft above sea degree on the rocky terrain of Siatista, Macedonia. The delicate pink wine, which has notes of pink currant and strawberry, was served in basic glass taverna tumblers. Also on provide was Lemonodasos — a lemonade made with citrus from a lemon forest in Poros, a port city within the Peloponnese peninsula.
The music: At the beginning of the night, the musicians Spiros Mandalas and Dimitris Christodoulopoulos, who carry out because the Singers of Zante, have been positioned on the store’s entrance steps. They performed the mandolin and the guitar and sung Ionian and Athenian kantades. Their lyrics mused on previous Athens, describing the labyrinthine again streets of Mouki Mou’s neighborhood and its lovely homes, flowers and girls. Once friends filed indoors, the duo introduced their music to the roof.
The dialog: Many of the friends have been longtime followers of Dosa and spent the night extolling the model’s love for craftsmanship, custom and upcycling. Others marveled at Athens’s new cultural panorama, discussing the opening of a brand new outpost of Michael Werner Gallery earlier within the month and the launch of the newest challenge of Nomas, an artwork and journey journal revealed by fellow visitor and photographer Yannis Bournias, 52.
Tip: When you’re internet hosting, costume merely. “I’ve considered this rather a lot since my husband and I opened the visitor home in Patmos,” says Lemos. “Flat sneakers are tremendous necessary since you’re operating round taking care of your friends.” In this case, Lemos wore the London-based model Le Monde Beryl’s black woven leather-based Mary Jane flats with a brief Dosa costume in khadi cotton and large cubic earrings in yellow gold by the New York designer Judy Geib. “You don’t need to outshine anybody, actually. You’re not the focal point. But it’s important to be elegant and comfy on the identical time. I need to prepare in 5 minutes after I host — my focus must be in every single place else.”
