Residence of Vasileiou Bouflis (Laz. Gounari) (1900)

The building was rebuilt by Vasilios Bouflis, who came from the village of Bouflis and was inhabited in 1904. The building was built as a residence, despite the fact that it was of huge dimensions. The debts from the reconstruction of the house were the reason to sell it to Lazaros Gounaris.
The building housed an auxiliary metropolis until 1912 and it was there that Serbian Prince Arsenios was accommodated during the liberation, while Crown Prince Constantine was at the same time accommodated in the Metropolitan Palace.
It is a twin two-story house, at the intersection of Eleftherias Avenue and Bijaniou Street, with a courtyard which is developed at the back of the plot.
The rectangular building has flat symmetrically arranged facades and shows a slight setback of the facade at the location of the two entrances. On the first floor, marble balconies protrude, with ornate metal railings and spiral porches. A “mosaic” is formed at the base of the building and the ground floor windows have decorative frames. The floor openings are more ornamented with triangular gables. The entrances to the dwellings appear with a particularly accentuated height dimension, as the double-leaf paneled doors form semi-circular skylights in their continuity. All these elements indicate the obvious influence of French classicism on the architecture of the facades.
In the 1940s-1950s, the Aristotle Association moved there and remained there until 1968-1970. Subsequently, the building changed various uses, until 1992, when it housed the Museum of Contemporary Art, which has now moved to its permanent residence in the Exarchus building.

TEXT SOURCE: http://history.eled.uowm.gr
SOURCES OF PHOTOS: Christos Tegos