LuxurIOS Philosophy
LuxurIOS Island Experience is a Greek owned travel and tourism business born out of a love for our country and respect for Greece's cultural and natural heritage.
Like most Greeks we passed our summers island hopping. We travelled and sailed in the Aegean and the Ionian seas, discovered each island's unique villages and natural beauty, swam in the safe and clear blue waters, grew up on fresh fish and meals from the local tavernas and experienced the famous heartwarming greek hospitality.
In 2003 we decided that we wanted to embrace and promote sustainable tourism in Greece and dedicate our mental, emotional and financial resources to protect the cultural and natural heritage of Ios.
We purchased a significant amount of land on Ios with the purpose of preserving it for the future by pursuing a model for sustainable development that included safeguarding vast tracts of natural landscape and building a small collection of villas, lounges and boutique hotels based upon environmentally-friendly design and construction, working closely with the local community thus providing direct economic benefits through responsible tourism development.
We believe that we do not have to damage the earth to accomplish our dreams so our aim is to use a very low-impact, environmentally sensible approach to sustainably develop the land we own by leaving 95% of it undeveloped, so that Ios’ natural beauty, unspoiled beaches, sense of place and Greek island cultural heritage continues to thrive for future generations of locals and visitors alike.
Our sustainable development philosophy is based on the following principles:
During the construction process all the materials we use, except wood, iron, glass and cement and some of the marbles, are produced locally. The uniqueness of this project is that our venues are built out of materials that are extracted from the ground of the actual building site.
We planted more than 55,000 trees so far including more than of 500 ancient (300+ year old) olive trees brought by boat from the mainland. They were destined to become firewood and instead have been given a second life in Ios.
Water management and harvesting is in the forefront of our land development philosophy. Every venue of ours has very large (for a total of 8.500 cubic meters) underground water reservoirs to collect water during the rainy season and consume it in the summer tourist season.
All the water from the daily cleaning of the venues and various water features is recycled in separate waste management reservoirs to be used for the watering of our trees.
As for the local community, we are actively committed to the well-being of the local community including donating the only boat that the Coast Guard of los has in order to protect the surrounding waters, vehicles to the police and a fire track protect the island from wild fires. We financially support the local medical center. When needed, we provided significant financial assistance to the Ios cooperative of shepherds. Each summer we organize an annual basketball camp and provide funds for music lessons and other activities during the slow months of winter.
