Strange Closets

While these Renaissance-era homes near the Vicenza city square are stunningly beautiful, they also exhibit what was then cutting age technology, which belies the myth that the period was characterized by ideas, art and happiness. For example, today we take peepholes and even video surveillance systems for granted, but it must have been a terrific [...]

The Economist kept me preoccupied for more than an hour of my eleven hour trip from Chicago to Vicenza, Italy. Reading the newspaper cover-to-cover is a surefire way to keep up with world events, but very often, I also glean interesting information related in some way to interior design, and this issue was no exception. [...]

Trying to select which map of Italy to use in today’s post left me stymied, so I compromised by selecting only my favorite 18. ↔ Today’s mobile phone map applications seem almost magical, but the ultimate device of its time was the printing press, which enabled killer apps like newspapers, books and of course, maps. [...]