Konstas and Elisa were great hosts! Any time again 🙂

  We absolutely LOVED this space. Perfect. So much character, amazing views, location ideal, charming as heck and quiet street but super close to the square... can’t recommend it enough. Will... read more stay here again for sure. Kostas was such a sweetheart and helped my friend with her ridiculously heavy suitcase to and from our meeting point and gave us great tips for the town. Can’t wait to return to Syros and this space

  The apartment was perfect for our group of four. It was cute and clean and the roof terrace was perfect for enjoying a glass of wine in the evenings. We... read more only stayed two nights but would have liked to stay longer and tried Elisa’s cooking class. There are a lot of stairs up to the apartment and we had large suitcases but we made it happen with a little teamwork and help from Kostas. He gave us some great tips for exploring the town. I would absolutely recommend!

  Villa Maria is a dreamlike place with wonderful hosts. I would have loved to take the view home with me. Go there, I can only recommend it!

  What a beautiful place with amazing views and authentic Syros charm, everything was so clean and neat and the towels and linen were of the best quality. What really ... read more and his wife are the most incredible hosts

  Une chambre magnifique, une vue extraordinaire, un accueil parfait et sympathique. Beaucoup d’attentions. Merci !

  We had a wonderful stay at Kostas/Elisa wonderful 19th century house! Hosts were so kind and nice, always there when needed and ready to help, and full of nice advices... read more about the town and the island.
The house was incredibly elegant and beautiful, very well situated, just above the main, wonderful square of Ermoupoli, but still very quiet.
We falled in love with the house, and also with this incredible city of Ermoupoli.
Would love to come again!

  This place is amazing! The view is stunning. Kostas is so nice and accommodating. Since nobody was renting the place after us, he let us stay as late as we... read more needed. He was very helpful with local tips. I can’t recommend this place enough. It was really a great stay. Thank you!!

  The room was fantastic, conform to the pictures and with a splendid view. Kostas has been one of the best host we have met in Greece. Very responsive and attentive... read more to our needs. He gave us great recommendations about restaurants and places to visit.

  We stayed seven people here for several days and nights. A nice and relaxing place with a home away from home warm feeling. Very friendly and kind hosts. Though, if... read more you have problems to walk on stairs, look for something else. This is in an area where you need to walk many stairs. No possibility to take a car here. However, if you don’t mind, this is very nice with an modern old feeling.

  Kostas perfectly knows his Island, Syros and he gaves us very good adresses! The room was perfectly located and cute. A perfect host that has always the smile! Really recomanded.

  Kostas Stefanou and Elisa Mavropoulou are wonderful people and gracious hosts, and they made our stay at their Villa Maria a sweet, comfortable, intimate, and very warm experience.
Even before... read more we arrived, Kostas’s prompt responses to our email questions revealed how friendly, knowledgeable, and attentive he is. And when we arrived in Syros, his clear directions brought us quickly from the ferry to the main square, where he was waiting with an easy smile and great enthusiasm for our visit.
Ermoupolis spreads out along the port and uphill from it with many pedestrian-only streets and many, many stairs. Kostas guided us along the few streets and up the stone steps to Ydras Street and the bougainvillea-covered entrance to Villa Maria, an old mansion that he and Elisa have beautifully and lovingly restored. After showing us to our room, Kostas sat with us at a table on the second-floor outdoor courtyard and annotated a map of the city and the island, providing what turned out to be fabulous recommendations for places to eat, towns to visit, beaches to swim at, and trails to hike. He is discerning and knows the most special and the best of the best. And Villa Maria is well located, making it very easy to get to any and all of the places of interest in the city, from the opera house to the Vaporia, St. Nicholas to the ferry terminal.
The information and photos on the Villa Maria website accurately describe it and depict the rooms. We loved our stay in Yakinthos (hyacinth). It is one of two rooms—the other is Narkissos (narcissus)—on the second floor that have balconies. The room has high ceilings, and, as the photos reveal, it is very light, spacious, and airy. The bed was comfy and had extra pillows. The balcony offers a commanding, unobstructed 180 degree view out to the port and beyond, where we witnessed dramatic sunrises daily and sat in the early evening with glasses of Assyrtiko to watch the waning colors. On a more mundane note, we were grateful that Yakinthos, unlike many hotel rooms and Airbnbs, had several electrical sockets so we could recharge everything at the same time.
There is a small communal kitchen down the hallway. It has a refrigerator, double burner hot plate, and sink. The kitchen is sufficiently equipped for one to prepare breakfast, lunch, and even a simple dinner. There is cookware, utensils, and in a hall cabinet, glasses, and dishware. It is stocked with bottles of drinking water, coffee, tea, sugar, etc. We shopped for breakfast food on nearby Chiou Street, a charming market street lined with fish, meat, produce, and specialty food markets as well as bakeries, and every morning we had our juice, tea, coffee, and fresh yoghurt outside in the sunny courtyard.
Concerning food, the ground floor of Villa Maria houses a spacious, professional kitchen, where Elisa conducts cooking classes in traditional Greek cuisine. Being foodies who love to cook, we were very interested in what Elisa had to offer. So we met with her at a café to talk about it. She has a winning smile, a bright, energetic, engaging intelligence, a warm personality, and a profound understanding of food in general and traditional dishes from all over Greece. She provided us with a cookbook worth of options for dishes and several sample menus that she could show us how to prepare. Together we put together a menu comprising mezes, salads, sides, a main, and a dessert. We cooked together for most of an afternoon. Not only did she carefully explain what she did and demonstrate how to do it, but also she provided background on ingredients and nutritional value. It was an amazing culinary experience, devoid of food pretension, preciousness, and fussiness; it was surpassed only by the flavors of the various dishes that we had prepared. A truly peak and very personal experience for us. And as a bonus, Elisa provides copies of the recipes.
Ermopoulis is an authentic city. It is not dominated by the tourist industry and has not been scrubbed and polished so as to give every selfie the perfect background. There is impressive architecture and natural beauty, and there is also graffiti, dilapidated buildings, and cats, lots of cats. There is a shipyard and large ships and ferries coming and going and blowing their horns. There is a hustle and bustle of residents going about their daily lives oblivious to tourists. But for us, this is what made the city and Syros a realistic experience, dramatically different from the crowded, “must see” cruise-ship islands. And if one chooses to visit Syros, one could not stay with more generous and welcoming hosts than Kostas and Elisa at their lovely and special Villa Maria.