On the neighboring island of Syros, in the port town of Ermoupolis, Christos Artemis ran a beloved natural wine bar called Cantina Analogue. He’s since closed it and returned to Tinos, the island where he was born and raised, to open a garden wine bar devoted exclusively to natural wines from Greek vineyards, where he’ll host dinners, wine tastings, and cultural events. The new space sits in the garden of another historic industrial building, an old olive mill, currently being transformed into a home for Greek natural wine that will also function as an art gallery, project space, and cultural gathering place.
Running Cantina Analogue opened up a new field of interest for him: the relationship between high-quality local products, hospitality, and multidisciplinary cultural events where art, food, wine, music, and people come together naturally. That’s what he wants to build at the new Tinos wine bar, and it’s also one of the pillars behind Koinono Tinos Gathering, the independent non-profit cultural organization he founded almost 10 years ago, which creates site-specific projects rooted in the island’s landscape, culture, and local communities.
It’s fitting that Artemis chose Tinos for this next chapter for Cantina Analogue, since the island’s relationship with wine runs deep. Tinos was once a serious wine-exporting island, its vineyards supplying wine, grape must, and raki far beyond its shores. That legacy was disrupted in the early 1600s, when the Venetians uprooted much of the island’s vineyard land to make way for wheat cultivation. Winemaking never truly recovered, and by the 20th century it had nearly vanished altogether.
The revival is a remarkably recent story. Over the past two decades, a new generation of producers has slowly brought vineyards back to life, rediscovering what the island’s unique landscape can offer. Today, a handful of wineries are putting Tinos back on the map, crafting wines that feel inseparable from their surroundings. Two varieties define the island’s modern identity: Assyrtiko, prized for its bright acidity and citrus-driven freshness, and Mavrotragano, a more intense grape that yields deeply colored, structured reds with impressive complexity and depth.
The name leading Tinos’s wine revival is T-Oinos, set among the dramatic granite landscape of Falatados. Founded by Alexandre Avatangelos and Gérard Margeon, the estate set out to restore vineyards on the island’s ancient soils, reviving indigenous varieties and planting across carefully rebuilt terraces using organic methods. Nearby, Volacus Winery offers an equally immersive expression of the island. Founder Michalis Kontizas planted his vines among the volakes, the enormous rounded granite boulders that give this part of Tinos its almost lunar appearance. Further inland, Domaine de Kalathas and Vaptistis Winery offer a more intimate expression of the island’s revival. Both are small, family-run wineries farming organically: Vaptistis pours tastings at the winery itself, while Domaine de Kalathas pours theirs at its shop, Kala Krasia, in town.
The Beaches
The Agios Romanos village and beach.
Photo: Getty Images
