In the picturesque Masouri of Kalymnos, an island with deep roots in the art of sponging, 90-year-old Yiannis Magriplis stands as living history. With eyes as blue as the sea that raised him and hands that still work tirelessly, he welcomes us to his family’s sponge workshop.
“Welcome to the world of sponging,” he says with a warm smile as he begins to unravel the thread of his life. His story is a journey that starts from his poor childhood in Kalymnos and spans three continents.
“When I started…”
“I was very young when I started. Illiterate,” he recalls. “I only went to the first four grades of primary school, and at the age of 17, I left for Australia“.
There, he stayed for nine years, working first as a labourer and later as a taxi driver, collecting money and learning English “on the street”, as he says.
His involvement in the sponge market
His return to Greece in 1963 marked the beginning of his career in the sponge trade.
“I met someone here, Antonis Makris, nephew of the great sponge merchant, Vouvalis. He urged me, because I also knew English, to get involved in commerce,” he narrates.
His first trip took him to Halicarnassus (Αλικαρνασσό, Turkish: Bodrum), where he bought 400 kilos of sponges.
From there, his entrepreneurial odyssey brought him face to face with the challenges of the European market in Germany and, finally, led him to America.
Travels in America
“I would get in the car and travel thousands of miles,” he recalled wistfully. “I was starting from New York, and having a big car, I would load it up and travel. I went to Boston, Philadelphia, Detroit, Cleveland, Minneapolis, Missouri, Chicago.”
Mr. Magriplis passionately advocates the quality of Greek sponges.
“The natural sponge is the best. It is a living organism,” he emphasises.
This belief has led him to travel the world promoting sponges.
“It wasn’t easy,” he admits, “but we had passion. We knew our sponges were the best in the world.”
The risks and difficulties
However, the sponge story is not just a success story. Mr. Giannis talks about the difficulties and dangers faced by the divers and also about the problems that appeared in the 80s.
“In ’86, there were big problems with the sponges. The seabed was destroyed,” he recalls sadly.
Despite the challenges, he continues to work in his workshop, shaping the raw sponges into works of art.
“Look,” he says, pointing to a sponge he just finished. “This could end up in a house in New York or a hotel in Paris. It is a piece of Kalymnos that travels around the world.”
Family tradition
The tradition of the Magripli family in sponges does not stop with Mr. Giannis. His son, Nicholas, is present in our discussion and is successfully continuing the family business, keeping alive the art and trade of sponges.
In fact, the grandson of Mr. Giannis, also Giannis, is here, marking the third generation of the family involved in this traditional art.
As the sun sets behind, Mr. Yiannis Magriplis stands in the workshop’s courtyard, surrounded by dozens of sponges and his family.
His story is a living example of Greek entrepreneurship, perseverance, and passion for quality.
It’s the story of a man who, despite adversity, managed to make Kalyani sponges known around the world, keeping alive a centuries-old tradition—a tradition that now passes safely into the hands of future generations.
Dimitris Stathopoulos is a columnist for Travel. Translated by Paul Antonopoulos.
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