Inside The Agora, a former market-turned-boutique hotel
Following extensive renovation of a former village market in Cyprus, The Agora recently opened its doors.
Comprising 18 rooms alongside a bar and Mediterranean-inspired restaurant, the property has been brought to life by Creative Director and interior designer Emilie Green Novél, as well as co-owner and General Manager Aleksander Eng. “I came here for a friend’s wedding and immediately recognised the atmosphere as something truly authentic,” says Eng. “I’m a cyclist, and so on my first morning, I woke up with the sun and went for a ride, and on my way back, I passed by the hotel, abandoned in the center of town. I immediately texted Emilie, my partner. From there, the ball just started rolling. I like to joke that the hotel life chose us, and not the other way around.”
Beyond the lobby is an open-air courtyard, adorned with white pillars and marble floors with terracotta, and white, striped sunbeds surrounding a guava green terrazzo pool. Touches of limestone and soft green tones meanwhile nod to the surrounding natural landscape. Solid oak flooring throughout the hotel – some with a herringbone pattern and some parquet style – has been sourced from Croatian oak trees.
Restaurant Novél pays homage to a classic Meditteranean kitchen, with hanging copper pots, shelves filled with jars of pickled vegetables and terracotta tiles dotted throughout. In the property’s bar, New York was the main inspiration, explains Green Novél. “This memory of pleasant nights at dark jazzy cocktail bars with velvet furniture and old paintings on paneled walls, which gave that old world feeling,” she adds. “The room is brightened with a twist of colours from plants, fabrics, books and pictures to make it loungey during the day.”
Guestrooms have been designed to hark back to another era, with touches of rattan and dark wood alluding to a Colonial-style aesthetic. Headboards in the Petite rooms feature prints of chickens or horses – courtesy of Madrid-based Delacova Design and nodding to the chicken coop and stables found on-site in the property’s former life. Antique and vintage items fill the rooms, sourced from across Europe.
Green Novél continues: “All of our own favorite accessories went into the hotel to make sure it was more authentic. We chose a painting by Mette Greftegreff, a self-taught Norwegian painter. The restrooms are often forgotten, but these are beautiful with their handmade brass sinks from Morocco, and palm tree wallpaper depicting climbing monkeys.”
