Discover Mestia

Mestia feels like arriving at the edge of the known world—a highland town at 1,500 meters where medieval stone towers rise against a wall of snow-capped peaks exceeding 5,000 meters. As the administrative center of Mestia Municipality, this remarkable settlement oversees 3,045 square kilometers of territory containing 132 villages scattered across some of Europe’s most dramatic mountain terrain. UNESCO inscribed Upper Svaneti as a World Heritage Site in 1996, recognizing both its medieval architecture and its outstanding natural landscape.

The Svan people who built these towers have maintained remarkable cultural distinctiveness through geographic isolation. Their language diverged from Proto-Kartvelian perhaps 4,000 years ago and shares no mutual intelligibility with Georgian. Svan polyphonic singing—recognized by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage—represents the most archaic form of Georgia’s famous choral tradition. Today, Mestia serves as the gateway to this extraordinary region, offering access to Georgia’s highest peaks, ancient glaciers, and authentic encounters with a living culture that has survived unchanged for millennia.