A decision to allow seven of the eight buildings in the old Columbia record company headquarters in the Athens neighborhood of Rizoupolis to be knocked down was blocked by the Council of State yesterday.

The court overturned a Culture Ministry decision reached in 2006 to allow the main entrance and one of the eight buildings to stand as listed structures but to allow the others to be demolished.

The owner of the site began knocking buildings down in May 2006 but the court ruled that the work should stop as the ministry committee had not examined in enough detail whether the whole site could have been protected.

A number of residents and Greek composers appealed against the ministry’s decision, arguing that the Columbia factory was a landmark in Greek music history as more than 200,000 songs had been recorded there.