Kostopoulos, who was also responsible for bardót’s interior design, art direction and brand identity, drew inspiration from the soulful lexicon of the Cycladic vernacular, appropriating traditional craft skills and techniques in creative ways, but at the same time tried to conjure the building’s original character by peeling away layers of prior interventions. Case in point, the front door which was returned to its original position, restoring the entry sequence through an open forecourt, and the limewashed façade which was painstakingly worked on to subtly expose its embedded stones.

Unfolding as a series of intimate, interconnected rooms, bardót’s interior takes a page from the whitewashed plasticity of traditional Cycladic settlements featuring sinuous contours, rounded corners and shapely niches coated in a white limestone wash. The result is a grotto-like sensation made all the more pronounced by curvaceous built-in furnishings, including an antique fireplace that morphs into a cozy daybed and a sculptural bar counter topped by a solid walnut wood countertop. Swathes of red-ochre limestone-washed surfaces add to the interior’s sensual aspect while strategically placed mirrors enhance its mystical ambience.

Considerably more austere in aesthetic, the dining courtyard espouses a modernist design language of clean lines and simple geometry. It nevertheless shares the interior’s sculptural sensibility thanks to the richly-textured, ridged walls, an effect achieved by dragging a spoon-like tool across fresh stucco. Purposefully increased in height to protect patrons from the harsh Aegean sun and conceal neighboring properties, the striated, gloriously white courtyard walls are complemented by red-ochre clay tiles that echo the bar’s interior palette. Used across the floor as well as for the built-in banquette seating and large planter, the hand-crafted clay tiles heighten the sense of craftsmanship.

Made from miltos, a copper-toned mineral that has been used by the Greeks since the Bronze age in a variety of fields, from art and crafts, to cosmetics and medicine, and even ship building, the clay tiles are part of a broader dialogue between modern Greece and the region’s vernacular heritage. This also applies to the collection of antiques and repurposed agricultural objects found across the premises (examples include a wooden butter churn that now serves as a stool and ancient oil jars turned into decorative objects) and the playful murals and ceramic plates by artist Christianna Economou. Complemented with a mix of contemporary and mid-century furniture, bardót’s scenographic marriage of past and present is carried on in the tapas-style menu of tweaked “grandmother’s” recipes along with the whimsical cocktail list of Greek-infused classics such as the peach negroni and the black salt margarita.