This busy street in the city center is packed with museums, historical buildings, and stunning architecture. Walk the street, listen to our guide, and visit one or two museums of your choice. And don't forget to take a break and enjoy some amazing Greek food!

Vasilissis Sofias Tour  | Cultural Places

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We hope you had a great time exploring Vasilissis Sofias Street. This tour has been designed by the Cultural Places team.

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Megaron Mousikis is the Hall of Music. It opened in 1991 and includes four halls. The hall hosts music, dance, and opera performances as well as lectures. It has gardens where you can enjoy concerts during the summer.

Megaron Mousikis, Athens' Concert Hall

Parko Eleftherias is a small green hill next to Athens' concert hall - an oasis in the city to enjoy the coolness of the greenery or have a coffee or lunch in the park’s café. In the heart of the park is a statue of Eleftherios Venizelos, one of the most prominent and intelligent Greek statesmen. There you can learn more about Venizelos’ life and his politics in the Venizelos Museum hidden behind trees.
Next to this museum is Athens' Municipality Arts Center. It hosts themed exhibitions presenting contemporary trends in art.

Parko Eleftherias

Aretaieio and Aiginiteio are two neoclassical buildings that are still used as hospitals.
 Aretaieio was built between 1896 and 1898 by Ilias Aggelopoulos and Ioannis Ioannou.
 Aiginiteio was built some years later between 1901 and 1909 by Anastasios Metaxas, a very famous Greek architect.

The Aretaieio and Aiginiteio Hospitals

Dromeas (the runner) is a giant sculpture, 8 meters tall. It is the work of Costas Varotsos.
It is constructed of thousands of sharp greenish pieces of glass stacked atop each other to form the blurred shape of a runner in motion.
The sculpture was created for an initiative led by the Municipality of Athens in 1988.
It was first displayed at Omonoia square and remained there until 1994 when it was moved to its present location.

Dromeas

At this metro station, you find a small underground museum.
 The findings are from archaeological excavations that took place during the construction of the metro and are exhibited in the stations where they were found. During the excavations an ancient cemetery, a street with successive layers, and a part of the city’s aqueduct of Peisistratus, which was constructed in the 6th century BC, were found.

Antiquities Exhibition in the Evangelismos Metro Station

The Athens' War Museum was established by the Hellenic State in 1964 in order to honor all those who fought for the country's freedom.
 The museum’s mission is to collect and exhibit Greek military artifacts and memorabilia from antiquity to the present day in order to preserve national memory and promote the historic continuity of Hellenism.
In the exhibition, distributed over four floors, you can find metal helmets from antiquity, as well as exhibits about the Greek War of Independence in 1821, the Balkan Wars, and World War I and II.

Athens' War Museum

The Byzantine and Christian Museum was established in 1914.
Its collection includes religious artifacts from the Early Christian, Byzantine, Medieval, post-Byzantine, and later periods.
The museum collection contains approximately 25,000 works of art.
In the middle of the courtyard, you can see an impressive building that today houses the Byzantine Museum, the Vila Ilisia.

The Byzantine Museum - Vila Ilisia

The Saroglion Megaron was built between 1924 and 1932 by the Greek architect Alexandros Nikoloudis.
It took its name from its donor, Petros Saroglou, an officer in the Greek artillery.
 Nowadays, the building houses the Armed Forces Officer's Club.

Saroglion Megaron

The museum is housed in a neoclassical building, the Stathatos Mansion.
It was built in 1985 by Ernst Ziller, a Bavarian architect who worked extensively in Greece, and was the residence of Otto and Athena Stathatos. The museum includes objects from the Cycladic Culture, which was active between 3200 and 2000 BC on the Cyclades, a cluster of islands in the central Aegean. 
You will also find a large collection of Ancient Greek art, with representative artifacts from the Middle Bronze Age to the very end of the Roman period, as well as artifacts from the Cypriot culture.

The Museum of Cycladic Art

The Benaki Museum of Greek Culture is housed in a beautiful neoclassical-style building. The collections at the Benaki Museum evolved through the contributions of several Greek and foreign donors. 
 The permanent exhibition is divided into three main areas: 1) artifacts from Prehistoric times to the end of the Roman period, 2) a Byzantine collection linking the ancient Greek world to that of modern Greece, and 3) a collection of historical heirlooms recreating the history of modern Greece from the end of the 18th century onwards.

The Benaki Museum of Greek Culture

The Italian Embassy is one of the most prestigious residential buildings in Athens. It was built in 1885 by the famous German architect Ernest Ziller, who oversaw the construction of many of the neoclassical buildings in Athens.
In 1903, it was bought by Prince Nicholas, the son of King George I of Greece, in order to live there with his wife.
From 1953 until today, it has hosted the Italian Embassy.

The Italian Embassy

The building in which the foundation is housed was built by the architect Vasilis Tsagri in the late 1920s, in the eclectic style combining morphological features from more European styles. It was bought by the Theocharakis Foundation in 2005.
Many concerts, exhibitions, and other events take place here.

The Theocharakis Foundation

The French Embassy is one of the most beautiful buildings on Vasilissis Sofias street, mirroring the glorious past of this area.
It was built between 1893 and 1895 by the architect Anastasios Metaxas, who also built the Aiginiteio hospital and the Benaki Museum on the same street.
 The building has been strongly connected to France, as its first owner was the great-grandson of Merlin de Douai, one of the foremost jurists of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Periods.
Today, it is the home of the French Embassy.

The French Embassy

Megaro Syngrou was built in 1872–1873 by Ernest Ziller as the residence of Andreas Syngros, a wealthy Greek man.
In 1921, the wife of Andreas Syngros left the building to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in her will.

Megaro Syngrou – the Ministry of Foreign Affairs

The Egyptian Embassy was built around 1885 by the famous architect Ernst Ziller, who also made the plans for other buildings in Vasilissis Sofias street.
Since the end of World War II, the building at Vasilissis Sofias street No. 3 has hosted the Embassy of Egypt. At the corner of Vasilissis Sofias street &amp; Panepistimiou, you will find some archaeological remains. These ruins are part of the ancient Athenian fortification, great walls that protected Athens in antiquity.

The Egyptian Embassy and a Hidden Surprise

The building was initially the Royal Palace of Greece. In 1843, Otto, the first King of Greece, and his wife Amalia moved in here. The royal families of Greece that followed Otto also made it their residence.
In 1929, it was decided that the Hellenic Parliament would move into the old palace.
 In front of the Hellenic Parliament, you can also see the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. It is a war memorial dedicated to Greek soldiers killed during the war. It was sculpted between 1930 and 1932 by sculptor Fokion Rok.
The tomb is guarded by the Evzones of the Presidential Guard, who stand proudly in perfect stillness and in all weather conditions.

The Hellenic Parliament

Vasilissis Sofias Street

Megaron Mousikis, the Athens Concert Hall

Megaron Mousikis is the Hall of Music.
It opened in 1991 and includes four halls.
 The hall hosts music, dance, and opera performances as well as lectures.
It has gardens where you can enjoy concerts during summer.

Vasilissis Sofias Tour

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