Greece · Attica · Athens
Anafiotika, Athens — Area Guide & Where to Stay
Anafiotika is a tiny cluster of whitewashed cottages clinging to the north-eastern slope of the Acropolis, and it belongs to Plaka, the old town of Athens. Its lanes are too steep for cars. Islanders from the Cyclades built the houses in their own village style, so the pocket looks more like an Aegean island than a capital city. People come for that quiet and for the ancient rock right overhead.
About Anafiotika
Where to stay in Anafiotika
The right area depends on your trip — here's what each neighbourhood is best for.
Almost no one sleeps in Anafiotika itself. The cottages are private homes, so the quarter has barely any rooms to rent, and the few that exist book up fast. Most visitors take a bed down in the wider streets of Plaka and walk up the steps whenever they please.
What you get here is calm and a short climb to the Acropolis. For nightlife or more space, look to central Athens, only minutes downhill.
About Anafiotika
What are the main landmarks in Anafiotika?
The real sight here is the settlement itself, a stack of white cube houses with blue shutters and flowering courtyards climbing a single slope of the hill. Two small chapels anchor the lanes. One stands at the very top, right against the bare rock of the Acropolis, whose northern edge is crowned by the Erechtheion.
Everything else the hill is famous for lies beyond the quarter, a short walk up or around through Plaka. So the draw here is the climb itself.
What is the history of Anafiotika?
The neighborhood grew in the middle of the nineteenth century, when stonemasons and builders from the Cycladic island of Anafi came to work on the new capital's buildings. They settled the rough north slope below the Acropolis and put up cottages in the only style they knew, the flat-roofed island houses of home. The name Anafiotika means little Anafi.
Because they came from across the Cyclades as well, the quarter kept an island character that the rest of Athens never had. Later building trimmed its edges, yet the core of small white houses held on.
Where is Anafiotika?
The quarter sits on the north-eastern face of the Acropolis, directly beneath its ancient walls. Below and around it lie the older streets of Plaka, which spread downhill toward the flat center of Athens. No road reaches the cottages.
You arrive on foot, squeezing through gaps between the houses and climbing worn stone steps that double as the lanes.
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Updated July 2026