The Incorporation of a New Aesthetic Conception into an Urban Environment of the Past: The Case of two Traditional Settlements on Paros during the Nineteenth Century

The nineteenth century in Greece is characterized by the broad application of the rules and principles of Neoclassicism. This trend has been expressed both in Town-planning and in Architecture. In the first, the straight line was used for the layout of streets, and the rectangular cluster was adopted for the articulation of urban areas and the creation of squares as a functional element of cities; and also as a means of elevating important architectures or works of sculpture, according to the principles of the Renaissance Town-planning. In the second, this trend has been materialized through the exact application of the rules of proportion, which has unfortunately been considered as the main feature of ancient Greek architecture. The result of this way of planning the built environment was the infiltration of cities and settlements throughout Greece by the aesthetic conception of Neoclassicism.