Pyrgi

Pyrgi, Chios: The Painted Village of the Xysta

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A balcony framed by carved black-and-white xysta patterns in Pyrgi, Chios

Pyrgi is the most photographed village on Chios, and no other village in Greece looks like it. Every house front in its medieval core is covered from ground to eaves in the black-and-white geometric patterns called xysta, scratched into the plaster in triangles, diamonds, zigzags and rosettes, so that the whole village reads as a … Read more

The Chios Mastic Villages (Mastichochoria)

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A house facade decorated with black-and-white xysta patterns in Pyrgi, Chios

The mastic villages of Chios, known as the Mastichochoria, are a cluster of medieval fortified settlements in the south of the island. Built to cultivate and protect mastic, the fragrant resin produced nowhere else on earth. With their maze-like alleys, defensive walls and, at Pyrgi, extraordinary black-and-white patterned facades, they are among the most distinctive … Read more