Takis Aivalis started his collection when his father, coming from America, gave him a small 1923 Kodak 1A pocket camera as a gift. As the years passed, his collection increased and in 1967 he had more than 300 cameras - of which six are aerial photographs - which he bought at low prices from New York antique shops, since in those years they were not considered collectibles. He continued to buy cameras from around the world, from various companies, along with aerial cameras used in the past by the US military, to create maps or photograph entire areas.
In 2001 the collection won a place in the Guinness Book of Records and today one can admire it by visiting this special museum in Mystras All the machines in the Museum are used with the appropriate certificate, except for a few exceptions that were bought new. Among the cameras are names such as: Kodak, Agfa, Argus, Coronet, Zeiss Ikon, Bilora, Dacora, Minotta, Nikon, Canon, Olympus, Polaroid, Zenit etc. The visitor can also see wooden cameras, negatives, lenses, accessories, as well as books on the art of photography.