"SPLEDID CITY - Athens Urban Stories" continues in its 3rd season its magical journey through Athens' space and time, broadcasting on ERT2 and providing essential entertaining company to TV viewers.

In the ten brand-new episodes, which start airing from late March 2022, the audience will have the opportunity to explore the dark Medieval Athens (the city of Saracen pirates, Venetians, and Franks), to reminisce about the birth of commercial Athens through advertising in a historical route full of memories, to realize the deep and special relationship between the capital and wine, from the era of its wine shops to today's wine bars, to learn about the watery side of the city, its waters and rivers, to experience our illustrious city through the struggles and experiences of women, to wander through Athenian streets and alleyways discovering the origins of their names, to ride the horse-drawn trams of the 1890s as well as the modern underground trains of the metro, to see Athens through the eyes of a tourist and revel in its magical nights.

In the familiar manner loved by fans of the series, historians, critics, sociologists, artists, architects, journalists, and analysts comment, interpret, or approach the topics highlighted in the 3rd season, contributing in their own way to the understanding, preservation of memory, and reflection on the multifaceted phenomenon called 'Athens'.

Town criers, hand-painted shop signs, and metal plates on pre-war groceries; cinema ads in newspapers of the day; paper posters from the late ’20s and ’30s; glowing neon in Athens of the ’60s and ’70s; giant billboards dominating city streets and building façades in the ’80s and ’90s — all these snapshots chart the evolution of advertising as it grew alongside Athens, shaping a distinct face of the capital.

What is this face? Through what media, strategies, and styles has it been communicated across the decades? And how has it interacted with the urban landscape? These are some of the central questions explored in the episode of Kleino Asty – Stories of the City titled “Athens Through Advertising.” The camera wanders through nostalgic “reklames,” retro slogans, and post-dictatorship creativity while probing deeper questions:

Is advertising art? Does it mirror society’s ideals, desires, and fears? Does it reflect, distort, or beautify the everyday life of each era? And if we take advertising as both a “barometer” and a “pulse recorder” of society — with the declared aim of selling and informing — what does this record reveal about Athens and Greece from 1870 to today?

The episode draws on the insights of distinguished guests and rich archival material, tracing the trajectory of Greek advertising from the infancy of local industry to the digital present. It showcases the methods, imagery, and tactics of pre-war and post-war campaigns, when consumer culture became deeply entwined with Athenian and Greek society.

Guides on this journey into the dazzling world of advertising — and its relationship with social life, commerce, and the cityscape — are (in alphabetical order):
Dimitris Arvanitis (Designer), Vasilis Vamvakas (Associate Professor of Communication Sociology), Argyris Vournas (Journalist, Publisher, Author), Eleni Gaglia (Architect), Petros Koskinas (Communications Specialist), Nikos Leoussis (Advertiser), Stavros Stavridis (Professor, NTUA School of Architecture), Sofia Strati (Associate Professor, PADA – Architect, NTUA Engineer, Graphic Designer), Betty Tsakarestou (Associate Professor – Director, ADandPRLAB, Department of Communication, Media and Culture, Panteion University), Petros Tsapilis (Publisher, Advertiser, Author).