Konstantinos Argiros headlined the Hellenic Initiative's ninth London Gala, which raised a record $512,000 for its economic development work in Greece and Cyprus.
Konstantinos Argiros headlined the Hellenic Initiative’s ninth Annual London Gala at The Dorchester on Thursday 9 October 2025, the philanthropic dinner the Anglo-Greek diaspora now fills a Park Lane ballroom for every autumn.
The evening raised a record $512,000 for the Initiative’s economic development and humanitarian programmes in Greece and Cyprus, and honoured two of its grantees. Make-A-Wish Greece, which has granted wishes to more than 4,000 children facing life-threatening illness since it was founded in 1996, took its award from the Initiative’s International Ambassador, Princess Tatiana Blatnik, accepted by Board President Eleni Konstantinidi and board member Konstantine Antonopoulos. Wise Greece, a non-profit built on the produce of small Greek growers, uses the profits from its sales to buy food for children, homeless families and the elderly living below the poverty line, and was honoured alongside it.
Greece’s Defence Minister, Nikos Dendias, and its Ambassador to the UK, Ioannis Tsaousis, attended as government guests, alongside the United States’ ambassadors to Greece and to Cyprus and Ukraine, Kimberley Guilfoyle and Julie Davis, evidence of how far beyond the diaspora’s own circles this dinner now reaches.
Argiros closed the night, the laiko singer whose ballad Athina Mou carried him from a Thessaloniki nightclub residency to sold-out houses at the Sydney Opera House and Chicago’s United Center, hosted as every year by board member Nikos Stathopoulos and executive director Peter Poulos.