Tuesday 18:52
Explore Albania
Albania’s ancient tower-houses kept blood feuds, sheltered enemies, and encoded an entire civilization. Now the state wants to turn them into hotel rooms. The question is what survives the transaction. by Livia Brunga (Tirana) Luli Hupi asks you to take your shoes off at the door. It is a small gesture, the kind that …
Explore Albania
When the world’s construction industry gathered in Nuremberg, Albania sent one company. The rest stayed home. by Elis Zenelaj (Tirana) From March 24 to 27, in the halls of the Nuremberg Exhibition Centre, something happened that Albania’s industrial press largely missed. Everest Sh.p.k., the Kamëz-based aluminum profile manufacturer, stood on the floor of Fensterbau …
Explore Albania
From snowfields above Epirus to the Adriatic shore, the Vjosa has flowed unbroken for millennia. Now, as the rafts return and the world takes notice, the river is teaching Albania something about what it means to leave a place alone. by Livia Brunga (Tirana) Zamo Spathara was standing on the bank of the Vjosa …
Explore Albania
The Monastery of the 40 Saints is a designated cultural heritage monument located southeast of Saranda’s port. Annual religious observances take place on 9 March, the feast day of the Forty Martyrs. by Rizarta Hoxha (Tirana) From the hill above Saranda, you understand immediately why someone in the sixth century decided to build here. …
Explore Albania
The ancient Persian holiday that Albanian communism tried to erase — and a family that kept baking anyway. by Livia Brunga (Tirana) The old woman is already awake at five. She has been awake at five on this day for as long as she can remember, and on the years when she wasn’t — …
Explore Albania
On two limestone hills above the Seman valley, the arc of an Illyrian civilisation — from its first walls to its last bishop — is still legible in stone. by Rabiela Myteveli (Fier) The walk from the parking area takes twenty-five minutes. The path climbs through scrub and dry grass, the hillside warming quickly …
Explore Albania
From the lynx-haunted forests of the Albanian Alps to the free-flowing Vjosa River and flamingo-filled Adriatic lagoons, Albania remains one of Europe’s last intact wilderness frontiers—raw, biodiverse, and still largely undiscovered. by Livia Brunga (Tirana) At dawn in the Munella mountains of northern Albania, frost clings to beech leaves and the forest holds its …
Explore Albania
High above the Osum River, inside the stone walls of Berat Castle, centuries of faith and color converge in Albania’s most luminous museum. by Rabiela Myteveli (Berat) The climb to the Onufri Museum begins in stone. Inside Kalaja e Beratit, narrow lanes thread between whitewashed houses and medieval walls. Laundry moves in the wind. …
