For those who are looking for a bit of “shopping therapy”, Thessaloniki is the place. Peacefully co-existing, the smart and the chic, the old and the traditional are in mutual admiration of one another. It is this very contrast and variety that makes shopping in Thessaloniki an experience to remember.

With its shopping thoroughfares and upscale districts, Thessaloniki has become decidedly western. In its shopping thoroughfares the traveller will find echoes of Paris and Milan. In the sweep of its crescent-shaped harbour and promenade, edged with luxury apartment blocks, one sees the modern waterfront precincts of Marseilles or Trieste, Italy. Lined with designer shops, high fashion boutiques, art galleries, gift shops, crafts studios and famous jewellers the central city streets, Tsimiski, Aghias Sohpias, Mitropoleos, Karoulou Diehl Koromila and Aristotelous will delight the most discerning visitor.

Local artisans specialise in leather, copper and bronze work and fine jewellery. With its inexhaustible source of inspiration from the historical past and from the influence of the cultural and natural environment, Greek jewellery continues to display the golden charm that it has evinced for the past 5,000 years. The process of transforming metal, whether precious or not, into a piece of jewellery is carried out with the particularly high level of skilled workmanship that characterises Greek artisans and helps create jewellery that conforms to the needs and spirit of contemporary aesthetics. Like ecclesiastical silver, secular silverware exhibits a high aesthetic quality and a great variety of forms and techniques. It includes household silver, accessories for men’s dress and above all jewellery worn with women’s dress. The techniques for making these objects were engraving, often adorned with niello or enamel, casting repousse and filigree.

Thessaloniki is also famous for its food markets. In the Modiano market, well known throughout Europe, visitors will find the Salonika – indeed the Greece – they came expecting to see. A two-acre hall of clamoring vendors, stalls overflowing with produce, meat and fish, cobbles slick with melting ice. Next to Modiano there are small taverns, coffee shops, places serving ouzo, very popular with a lot of artists. A few steps away, on Komninon Street one will discover the Louloudadika, or outdoor flower market, and the crumbling terra cotta walls of 16th century Turkish-Jewish baths. Nearby Proxenou Koromilo Street lays claim to the Europe of glitz and glamour. In a two to three-block reach there are trendy window displays of women’s wear, hip men’s fashions and offerings of minimalist furniture. There is an impressive variety of jewellery, an indispensable accessory particularly for women’s dress, the quality varying with the purse.

Other traditional markets are those of Vlali, Kapani, Agora Solomou and Vardaris. In stoa Karasso (Karasso Arcade) and Bezesteni women may buy real or custom jewellery, as well as innumerable little fashionable objects. A few blocks away, in Coppersmith’s street, there are a great number of coppersmith’s shops with a prominent eastern influence.