Matogianni

About this audio guide

This guide to Matogianni, Mykonos's boutique-lined pedestrian lane, opens with a question: why a single watch in a shop window needs its own lock, alarm and camera on a street otherwise selling linen and gelato. It traces the lane's name back to a hero of the eighteen twenty-one uprising against Ottoman rule, and follows its slow turn from a row of houses where weavers, bakers and cobblers worked, through the arrival of sailors and artists, to the yachts and money that remade it into the Old Town's glittering spine. You'll hear how some of today's boutiques are still run by descendants of those same weaving and baking families. Look at what a shop owner has chosen to bolt down before you decide it's just decoration.