CHORA OF AMORGOS: AN ARCHITECTURAL PROMENADE

This new photo book on the Aegean hill town of Chora, on the island of Amorgos in the Greek Cyclades, presents an architectural reading of the town’s composition - the natural landscape and the built fabric - and how they mutually shape one another. Perched 400 meters above sea level, the town reveals itself through winding alleys, whitewashed houses, vaulted passages, and domed churches. It is a settlement shaped over centuries in dialogue with its rugged landscape.

Bringing together first-hand impressions, photographs, and notes, the book explores not only the town’s structure and architectural details, but also seeks to uncover the timeless principles that underlie its form. Reflecting on how vernacular buildings arise from limited yet carefully chosen materials, modular dimensions, and regulated proportions - producing settlements of striking coherence - these lessons resonate with Bernard Rudofsky’s vision of "Architecture Without Architects" and the early 20th century modernist architects fascination with the white cubic forms of Mediterranean towns.

Chora emerges here as more than a picturesque village: it is a living record of how communities, across generations, inscribed their way of life into the fabric of a place - an architecture at once modest, enduring, and deeply in harmony with nature.

Ali Kural is a practicing architect and urban designer with degrees from Harvard University Graduate School of Design and the Middle East Technical University.