Chara VeniouSenior graphic designer · brand, packaging & spaces
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Illustration · EditorialA&M Architects · internal project
A woman walking past the Our Kypseli map hanging unfolded on a white wall

Our Kypseli

When you join A&M, you also join Kypseli. I wanted new colleagues to have the neighborhood in their pocket from day one, with the places we love and a few of its stories.

At a glance

A map of the neighborhood around our office, for everyone who joins A&M, with the places we love and twenty stories about its buildings. I walked it street by street and asked the whole team before I placed a single pin.

The brief

At A&M, your first day starts with a welcome kit: a bold tote with an office guide, notebooks, pencils, desk objects and some tea. The office wanted the kit to show how we work and how we live around here, and a map of the neighborhood was the natural place to start. The office is on Drosopoulou Street, in the heart of Kypseli, one of the liveliest neighborhoods in Athens.

The folded map, with the notebook and pencil from the same kit
The folded map, with the notebook and pencil from the same kit
The front: five categories, each with its own color, band and pins
The front: five categories, each with its own color, band and pins
The back: the cover, twenty fun facts and the ampersand pattern
The back: the cover, twenty fun facts and the ampersand pattern

The idea

I thought of it as a friend showing you around. The streets stay a soft light gray, so the color can go to the places people actually go: food, coffee, theaters, cool spots and drinks. Each category has its own color, its own band around the edge of the sheet and its own numbered pins, so you can find a souvlaki place or a late bar in a few seconds. The titles are handwritten, the drawing on the cover is one loose line, and the office is a little black star among the pins.

Project

Client
A&M Architects · internal project
Industry
Architecture · employer brand
Services
Illustration · Editorial
Role
Senior graphic designer · map and editorial design
Year
2025
Team
In-house at A&M Architects · with places and stories from the whole team

In numbers

  • 119places on the map
  • 28food spots, in six kinds from souvlaki to taverns
  • 22theaters
  • 20fun facts on the back
The folded map, with the notebook and pencil from the same kit
The folded map, with the notebook and pencil from the same kit
The front: five categories, each with its own color, band and pins
The front: five categories, each with its own color, band and pins
The back: the cover, twenty fun facts and the ampersand pattern
The back: the cover, twenty fun facts and the ampersand pattern
The black star is the office, on Drosopoulou Street
The black star is the office, on Drosopoulou Street
Twenty fun facts, mostly about buildings, since the map was going to architects
Twenty fun facts, mostly about buildings, since the map was going to architects
The ampersand pattern
The ampersand pattern

“Looking for the stories behind a project is where I always start, and this one had plenty.”

The detail

I know Kypseli from my student years, when I spent a lot of time exploring it, and I’ve watched it grow and change ever since. For the map I walked it again, street by street, and dug through everything I could find online. Inside the office I asked everyone for their favorite places to eat, drink and get coffee, and the colleagues who have spent years in the neighborhood told me the stories they remembered. Looking for the stories behind a project is where I always start, and this one had plenty. Sorting it all took a while, and the food alone needed six categories: souvlaki, pizza, street food, homemade, international and taverns. The stories became twenty fun facts on the back. Kypseli got its name from the bees, because the first residents thought it buzzed like a hive. Fokionos Negri is a pedestrian street built over a stream, which is why its buildings stand so far apart. And since the map was for a team of architects, most of the facts ended up being about buildings: one of the first apartment blocks in Athens, the Bauhaus corners, the curved balconies, the marble staircases and the block on the corner of Kerkyras and Parou that looks like a ship.

Close-up of the Kypseli map: gray streets with numbered colored pins and a black star for the office
Choosing the paper from a swatch book
Choosing the paper from a swatch book
Research notes: the places the team recommended
Research notes: the places the team recommended
The map inside the new-member welcome kit
The map inside the new-member welcome kit

In production

I followed the printing. We tried several versions before we settled on how the map should fold and how big it should be. It folds down to the size of its orange cover, so it fits in the tote next to the notebook, and unfolded it’s big enough to go on a wall. The back carries the cover, the fun facts and a pattern made from the A&M ampersand.

Production notes

  1. 01Neighborhood map of Kypseli for the A&M New Member Welcome Kit, 2025
  2. 02Research, content, map design and cover illustration
  3. 03Walked the neighborhood and collected the team’s recommendations and stories
  4. 04Printing followed through, after several versions of fold and size
  5. 05Designed in-house at A&M Architects, as part of their team

Since then

The kit was made for us, for the people walking into the office for the first time, and I like to picture them unfolding it on their first lunch break, looking for souvlaki. A&M later shared it publicly too, as part of showing the graphic design work behind its architecture and its life as a studio.

Links

A&M Architects
The project

Credits

3D visuals
Xenia Liodi
Rights
© A&M Architects AE · Files are presented with the permission of A&M Architects AE
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