From a distance, Mykonos, dressed in dazzling white limestone, looks like a giant sculpture. The stark white houses, so typical of the post-Byzantine Cycladic tradition, look like rocks "strewn by the Great Creator of the world," as the Greek architect Aris Konstantinidis noted in his homage to the island's architecture, Two Villages from Mykonos. The landscape is naked, sparse, with just a few trees and a few thorny bushes battered by wild winds.

Mykonos is an island defined by its traditional cubist architecture. "Unless you have seen the houses of Mykonos, you can't pretend to be an architect," Le Corbusier, the legendary pioneer of modernism, declared after his first visit to the Cyclades in 1933. "Whatever architecture has to say, it is said here."

West of the island lies Hora, the main town and harbour capital. From its ancient promenade and hanging patios, one never tires of witnessing – again and again – the most incredible spectacle repeating itself every early evening: the sun melting or dissolving into a purple-red Aegean. The best spot to experience it is the old area of Kastro; from its heights, one cannot get enough of watching the sun exiting grandly behind the arched bell tower of Panagia Paraportiani.