Ermoupoli

Ermoupoli is the capital of Syros and, more broadly, the administrative seat of Greece's entire South Aegean region, a status that says a lot about a town most visitors expect to be a quiet island port. It was founded in the 1820s during the Greek War of Independence, when refugees fleeing the fighting on Chios, Psara and other islands settled on the empty slope below the older hill town of Ano Syros. Named for Hermes, god of trade, the new town grew explosively: within decades it was the leading commercial and industrial centre in Greece, and its shipyards launched thousands of vessels before Piraeus overtook it in importance toward the end of the 19th century.

A Town Built by Refugees

Nothing about Ermoupoli is ancient in the way most Greek towns are. Syros already had a settlement — Ano Syros, built by the Venetians at the start of the 13th century on the hill of San Giorgio and Catholic ever since — but the shoreline below it was open ground until the war of independence drove thousands of displaced islanders ashore. Choosing Hermes, god of commerce, as the new town's patron turned out to be well judged. The Greek Steamship Company was founded here in 1856, and the Neorion yard followed in 1861, the oldest shipyard in the country and still in operation today. Through the 1860s Neorion built not only hulls but steam engines, boilers, pumps and heavy guns, and an engine of its own design was exhibited at the Paris International Exhibition of 1878. Only when Piraeus took over as Greece's principal port did the boom finally cool.

The Neoclassical Townscape

That boom left behind a townscape almost unique in the Cyclades: tiers of neoclassical mansions, marble-paved streets and grand public buildings climb the amphitheatre of hills around the harbour, most of it raised between the 1820s and the 1860s while the money was flowing. Miaouli Square remains the social heart of the town, a broad marble expanse lined with palms and cafes. The town hall that dominates it was designed by the Bavarian architect Ernst Ziller, begun in 1876 and completed in 1898; it is the largest town hall in Greece, with three storeys facing the square and two at the rear where the ground rises behind it. North of the waterfront lies Vaporia, the quarter of shipowners' and captains' houses, where marble balcony supports and painted ceilings were paid for by the export trade, and where the blue dome of the church of Agios Nikolaos is one of the first things you pick out as a ferry comes in.

Theatre, Museums and Industrial Heritage

The Apollo Theatre is the building most visitors come to see. The Italian architect Pietro Sampò drew on four Italian houses, La Scala among them, and the theatre was built between 1862 and 1864, opening on 20 April 1864 with Verdi's Rigoletto performed by an Italian company. It seats roughly 350 today, was rebuilt in stages after the Second World War and reopened fully in 2000; since 2002 it has hosted the Aegean Festival and the Animasyros animation film festival. The Archaeological Museum is older still, founded in 1834 as the central museum of the Cyclades and housed inside Ziller's town hall since 1901, with core collections from the prehistoric sites of Chalandriani and Kastri — the latter dated to 2800-2300 BC and one of the earliest settlements in Greece to be protected by stone walls. The Industrial Museum, opened in 2000 across three former factories, a paint works, a lead-shot works and a tannery, covers the other half of the story, down to the Enfield 8000, the first electric car built in Greece.

Ermoupoli by Sea

The working harbour that built the town's fortune is still very much in use, handling ferries, cargo and private boats side by side, and Syros sits at the crossing point of most Cycladic ferry routes rather than at the end of one. The 2021 census recorded 13,399 residents in the municipal unit and 11,039 in the town itself, which makes Ermoupoli one of the larger population centres in the island group and one of the few Cycladic towns that does not empty out in winter. Its history as Greece's main port of the 19th century gives it a genuine claim to maritime heritage rather than a manufactured one, and many gulet cruises in Greece call in here to take in the mansion-lined waterfront of the Vaporia district before continuing on through the Cyclades. Anyone with a spare afternoon should climb the stepped lanes to Ano Syros for the view back down over the tiled roofs, and for the tavernas around the birthplace of Markos Vamvakaris, the rebetiko musician born there in 1905.