Our villa is found in Mavrikiano, a small village at the top of a hill, over the Mirabello bay and the seaside village of Elounda, offering panoramic views towards the surrounding hills and olive trees. Even though this area lies, practically at the edge of Elounda, one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world, Mavrikiano village, manages to keep its character of a typical Cretan village so one can combine, the simplicity of a village with the cosmopolitan Elounda.
The villa is practically divided into two separate, autonomous houses. ''Erato'' at the ground floor and ''Clio'' at the upper floor.
The property used to be part of an old Church demolished by the Turks at the end of the 15th century. It has been rebuilt using only stone and wood. Reverence and respect of the old structure has been exercised with the help of the local people and their stories.
A private swimming pool and a summer kitchen with BBQ lie right in front of the villa. The main entrance of House ''Erato'' at the ground floor leads to a comfy sitting room with two single beds and a beautiful stone fireplace. To the left is the kitchen and in the middle is the bathroom with Jacuzzi. The stairs will bring you up to the mezzanine floor and the master bedroom with an old double bed c 1920, dominating the room. The lamps belonged to the old church.
An external staircase goes up to the House ''Clio'' at the upper floor. The house's layout is exactly the same as of ''Erato'' at the ground floor.
All rooms at both houses are laid out just as they were originally built in the old days for a family, meaning that you must walk through one space in order to reach the next. Therefore, surprising as it might sound, there are no in-between doors, except for the bathrooms of course.
Cartwheels dating back to the beginning of the last century have been transformed into the main lighting. Kitchen utensils are copies of originals and the plates are of a type still in use in most villages of Crete.
All the furniture are copies of originals found in the Historical Museum of Heraklion, Crete, but the lamps and fittings are original. The tiles used for the house reconstruction are hand made, dated c 1920, and were taken from old demolished houses in the area. The marble sink was found in a Turkish Hammam. The taps are copies of those of the 1920's. The reddish plaster on the walls is made of ground tiles, the same material that was used in the monasteries of the period 14th - 16th century.