Canaves Sunday has eight suites in the pedestrian heart of Oia, and you reach them by a side path. The entrance is set back from Nikos Nomikos, the promenade that runs along the caldera edge, and the house is cut down into the cliff below it. That is what keeps the noise of the village off the rooms.
It is the smallest of the four Canaves houses in Oia. The suites are on the lower levels, so only the reception and the Veranda bar are overlooked by anything above them.
Eight keys, and the family behind them
The 3 to 1 staff ratio is the arithmetic behind the attention. Guests are taken from 13 and over, which the house puts down to the cliffside site and to the quiet of the other suites. For a building cut into a cliff it asks comparatively little of the legs: there are fewer steps than most houses on the Oia caldera, and some of the suites are at street level. Check-in is at 3.00pm and check-out at 11.00am.
The property opened in the summer of 2017, next door to the collection’s existing Oia houses. The lineage behind it is older. In 1986 Yiannis and Anna Chaidemenos converted two 17th-century wine caves in Oia into rooms, and that is where the Canaves Collection began. Their sons, Markos and Alexandros Chaidemenos, took the company over from them in 2010. It is still family-owned and family-operated, and every one of its houses is on Santorini.
The suites
There are five room types. The smallest is a Double Room with Caldera View at 35 square metres. The Deluxe Suite with Caldera View and the Master Suite with Infinity Pool are both 55 square metres, the Honeymoon Suite with Hot Tub is 65, and the largest is the Grande Suite with Caldera View, 85 sq m, two bedrooms, sleeps four. Two large verandas look out from the Master Suite over the Aegean.
What goes into the rooms is Greek. The mattresses are by Coco-Mat and the bathroom products come from Naxos Apothecary. Maid service is twice daily, and breakfast is served from 8.00 to 11.00am.
Taken as one 10-bedroom villa, up to 20 guests have the house to themselves. That is the form a wedding or a family party takes here, and the villa is listed as a room type of its own.
The pool, the spa and the table
The infinity pool is the whole of the facilities on the site. It is seasonal, fresh water and unheated, and it faces the Aegean. There is no gym and no spa. The house answers that by sending guests 80 metres along to the spa at its sister property, Canaves Oia Suites, or by arranging treatments and yoga classes in the suite.
Veranda sits at the highest point in Oia, with a 180-degree outlook over the caldera and the Aegean. It was Veranda Aperitivo Bar, and the rebrand to Veranda Sushi & Sunset Bar changed the kitchen along with the name: sushi and signature cocktails, served from 5.00pm to 10.30pm. By day there is a pool bar menu of flatbreads, a burger and lobster linguine. Dinner proper belongs to a sister house, Adami at Canaves Ena, ten minutes on foot, and room service in the suites is around the clock.
Who is this for
Couples and friends who want the village at the top of the path and a quiet house at the bottom of it. Nikos Nomikos above the door has boutiques, galleries, tavernas and bars; the ruins of Oia castle are 11 minutes on foot, and the bus to Fira leaves five minutes away. Inside, the mood is plain and deliberate: polished white floors, matte white walls hung with contemporary art, a carved headboard made one at a time, and a herd of life-size white plaster donkeys at the restaurant door.
