Dexamenes Seaside Hotel PELOPONNESE, GREECE Double rooms from about £110 It might be hard to resist the siren call of the Greek Islands, but this daring, brutalist-style hotel is a reason to stick to the mainland. Nikos Karaflos was only 16 when his family business bought an abandoned Twenties winery amid the honeyed sands of Kourouta Beach, on a quiet stretch of the western Peloponnese. He thought it would be a good location for a hotel and, 17 years later in 2019, bold, original Dexamenes was opened, looming on the edge of the Ionian Sea like a land-bound, minimalist ocean liner. {Booking now here}
Athenian architectural firm K-Studio has played on the site’s industrial aesthetic: steel, terrazzo and glass are combined with wood and canvas inspired by the area’s nautical history. Two lines of concrete blocks house the 34 rooms, hewn out of individual storage tanks, each one with a monastic sense of calm that never feels austere, partly due to the rich patina left by the wine on the interior walls. The rooms to book are the nine facing the sea, and there is also a three-bedroomed neo-classical-style villa directly on the beach. {Booking now here}
Days are spent barefoot in the sand, then feasting taverna-style on the terrace under strings of lights, perhaps on a carbonara with a Greek twist or grilled dorade with salsa verde, accompanied by an impressive list of local wines. Spa treatments, meditation, yoga and sound-healing are offered in one of two large, weather-worn steel silos, and there are candlelit dinners and sleep-outs under the stars. This is a long-held dream turned strikingly original reality. {Booking now here}
Coco-Mat Hotel Nafsika ATHENS, GREECE Double rooms from about £100 Can minimalist ever be cosy? Take a fast train north from the centre of Athens to the smart, quiet suburb of Kifissia and, after a five-minute walk from the station, you’ll discover that particular combination can be an unexpected success. {Booking now here}
Coco-Mat Hotel Nafsika is a pared-down, fuss-free, warmly welcoming hotel, a modern building full of glass, in which the open-plan ground floor is given over to eating, chilling and keeping in touch. At its centre is a kitchen and all-day buffet, with wooden tables lit by pendant lamps, and brightly coloured chairs. There are long white sofas scattered with cushions, a workstation with computers, shelves of books on Athens; and across one wall, pillows. Pillows? {Booking now here}
The hotel is owned by Coco-Mat, a bedding company that specialises in natural materials, and here you can not only choose the type of pillow you want to rest your head on, but buy it, too. All the beds and linens, as well as much of the furniture, in the 22 bedrooms and suites are by Coco-Mat. You will sleep soundly. In the morning, watch bread being kneaded for the oven, and choose from a wide range of healthy, imaginative dishes. Outside there’s a scented herb garden, and a rack of bikes for exploring the area. It maybe 40 minutes to the city centre, but the charms of this quietly hip yet unpretentious address make it a popular in-the-know base. For more, see our pick of the best hotels in Athens. {Booking now here}
Parilio Hotel PAROS, GREECE Double rooms from about £190 As Santorini and Mykonos become ever more crowded, savvy hoteliers are shifting their focus to the lo-fi Greek islands. That’s certainly the case for husband-and-wife owners Kalia and Antonis Eliopoulos who, for their fourth venture, pinpointed the peaceful north-east coast of Paros. {Booking now here}
The setting is spot-on: Parilio is a stroll away from sandy Kolympithres beach and 10 minutes’ drive from Naoussa, an elegant harbour town with a waterfront full of tavernas and late-night bars tucked away in higgledy-piggledy, boutique-lined back streets. Then there’s the hotel itself, a series of simple white cubes, all sharp lines, wooden shutters and huge terracotta urns. Inside, the rooms have cool porcelain floors, a grown-up earthy palette and interesting decorative touches (an embroidered wall hanging, a handmade abstract-patterned plate). Couples snooze under cream umbrellas by the lap pool, where courgette fritters are served for lunch and the barman mixes zingy Mojitos. {Booking now here}
Bag a table for supper on the terrace of the buzzing Mr E restaurant. Named after a fictional aristocratic explorer, it puts a global spin on traditional Greek dishes such as beef fillet with Malvasia wine or bream baked in lemon leaves with chickpea stew. It’s all exactly what you want for a laidback escape, away from the thrum. {Booking now here}
