Ziller District or Mansion District

The German architect Ernst Ziller in 1875 bought an undeveloped area in the region of the uninhabited Alexandras Square, where he rebuilt in 1877 a series of 7 mansions. The first mansion was used by King George I and Queen Olga as a summer house. In the second house lived a Russian woman, a maid of honor of the Queen. The Emm. Benaki family lived in the third house and the Horn family lived in the fourth. The remaining three were used by prominent Athenians of the time for their summer holidays. The location of the mansions is found in the topographic plan of Piraeus, drawn up in 1875 by the German architect J.A. Kaupert and referred to as “Villen-Colonie Ziller”. Behind the complex of mansions, the Ziller (Ernst’s brother Paul) – Origoni (Corsican businessman B. Origoni) glass factory was located as early as 1872, which Ziller then converted into his summer house. The semicircular facade of the corner with the decorative element of the Caryatids was particularly characteristic. In 1980, both the glassworks building and the mansions were demolished. A related aspect of the area is depicted in the work of Yannis Tsarouchis “Alexandras Square and Turkolimano” and related descriptions are preserved in the contents of the book “Trelandonis” by Penelope Delta (1932).