STORY
Dexamenes Seaside Hotel, Kourouta Beach, Amaliada: Unpretentious, conscious luxury A wine factory turned into a stunning seaside hotel that truly cares about the guest experience. Owner Nikos Karaflos felt the powerful energy of the place and knew „that a hotel would have to be the next stop in the history of this place.“ Let yourself be sucked into the intriguing story of how Dexamenes Seaside Hotel – a conscious luxury resort located in the Western Peloponnese that once was a wine factory – became a highlight of hospitality. Let’s go back in time. Come on, stroll along with me: After achieving independence from Ottoman rule in 1830, Greece made currants its main export. However, following a drop in demand for the fruit in the late 1800s, the country began to explore possible new uses for its unsold currants. This gave rise to the construction of the first wineries and distilleries. A perfect example of the architectural methods employed at the time, the winery that houses Dexamenes was built on the water so that the wine could be pumped directly onto ships. The winery belonged to the „Autonomous Currants Organization“, an organization that was founded in order to face the currant crisis that broke out in Greece by the beginning of the 20th Century. In 1997 this organization quit its operation and so the winery got abandoned. The property was later sold to the Karaflos family. „Being a native, I knew the place and its history since I was a student. →
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“I started analyzing the layouts of the Wine tanks and I decided that these spaces would be perfect for hotel rooms”. Nikos Karaflos, owner of Dexamens Seaside Hotel