Skorpios sits just east of Lefkada in the Ionian Sea, irregularly shaped, running roughly north to south. At 83.2 hectares — about 205 acres — it is small enough to walk across in an hour, large enough to sustain the illusion of a private world. When Onassis acquired it, the island was largely bare rock and scrub. The transformation he imposed was systematic and expensive: hundreds of species of trees planted across the hillsides, a harbor built to accommodate one of the world's great private yachts, three residences constructed at various points around the shore. The sand beach that appears natural was engineered. Nothing about Skorpios happened by accident. It was designed as a stage, and for a decade it served as one of the most closely watched private stages on earth.

The wedding of Aristotle Onassis and Jacqueline Kennedy shocked much of the world. She was the widow of an assassinated American president, five years out of her Washington life, still in her thirties. He was a 62-year-old Greek shipping billionaire, previously divorced, known for his wealth and his appetite for spectacle. The ceremony took place in the small Chapel of Panayitsa — the Little Virgin — on Skorpios, conducted in Greek Orthodox rites. Photographers tried to reach the island by boat and were turned away. The guests were few. After the service, the wedding party moved to the Christina O anchored in the northern harbor. The world's reaction, particularly in the United States, ranged from bewilderment to outrage. Onassis, by most accounts, was satisfied.

Onassis died in 1975. He is buried on Skorpios, beneath the cypresses near the chapel. His son Alexander, who died in 1973 following a plane crash, is buried beside him. His daughter Christina, who inherited the island upon her father's death and died in 1988, is buried there too. Three graves on a small forested island in the Ionian Sea. Christina's daughter Athina Onassis became the sole surviving heir, and Skorpios passed to her. In 2013, Athina sold a long-term lease on the island and its smaller neighbor Sparti to Ekaterina Rybolovleva, daughter of Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev, for $153 million. Development of a luxury resort began in 2018, though Skorpios is a Natura 2000 protected area and no more than 5% of its land may be developed.

The trees are the most enduring thing. Over 200 species now cover hillsides that were bare scrub sixty years ago. The harbor is still there. The three residences stand. The island holds its shape as a private world, even as its ownership has shifted and its future is being redesigned. Onassis wrote in his will that Skorpios should remain in the family as long as the family could afford its upkeep — and that if they could not, it should be donated to the state. That contingency, whatever its legal complications, captures something true about the island: it was always more than real estate. It was a project, a statement, an act of creation by a man who believed that places, like people, could be remade from scratch.