Coming Home: Why I'm Moving As Above to Athens

Six years ago I landed in New York with a suitcase, a tattoo machine, and no plan beyond the next client. I didn't know the city would give me a career. I definitely didn't know I'd spend six years building one, and that at the end of it, I'd pack it all up and bring it home.

I was born in Sparta. Greece isn't a backdrop to my work, it's the source code. Sacred geometry, mandalas, the discipline of repetition, all of it traces back to something I absorbed before I ever picked up a machine. New York sharpened the craft. It gave me Monolith, it gave me thousands of hours on skin, it gave me the kind of pressure that turns a tattoo artist into something more precise. But precision was always in service of something older than New York. And that something has been calling me back for a while.

So here it is: I'm moving As Above to Athens.

This Isn't a Relocation. It's an Expansion.

I want to be clear about what this is, because it's not a guy getting tired of the city and going home. As Above Athens is the next chapter of everything I've been building, a contemporary tattoo studio, a podcast space, and an art education collective, all under one roof, in Nea Filadelfeia.

Three ways to create. One space. That's the model.

I didn't want to just open another tattoo shop. I wanted to build a hub, a place where the tattoo work happens, where the conversations get recorded, and where the next generation of artists actually gets taught the craft instead of guessing their way through it. Mandala and sacred geometry work is not something you improvise. It's built on structure, patience, and thousands of repetitions before you're any good. That's the same principle the whole space is built on.

What Stays the Same

The New York chapter isn't closing, it's just changing shape. I'll still be back at Monolith in Brooklyn for guest spots, the relationships I built there don't end because I changed zip codes. If you've been waiting for a session with me and you're New York based, that door isn't shut.

But the center of gravity is moving. Athens is where I'm building the flagship. It's where the studio, the podcast, and the education side all live together, not as three separate businesses, but as one collective built around the same discipline: geometry, chaos, craft.

Why Now

Twenty years in this industry taught me that timing isn't about waiting for the perfect moment, it's about recognizing when you've built enough to build something bigger. I've spent two decades on mandala and sacred geometry work, exhibited internationally, published a book, and built a name in a city that doesn't hand those out easily. That foundation is exactly what makes this move possible instead of reckless.

This has been a twenty year goal, not a recent idea. Athens was always the endpoint. New York was the training ground.

If you're a client, a future collaborator, a podcast guest, or someone who wants to learn the craft, this is the beginning of that.

Create with us.

— George