From Wednesday, September 30 to Saturday, October 3, 2015, the city of Bologna will become part of the international network of design-related events with the first edition of Bologna Design Week (BDW), a diverse networking platform and cultural itinerary about the propulsive power of design for innovation and promotion. The event will be...

Coming back to grace Bologna’s Piazza Maggiore for its second year, is MortadellaBò. If you’ve heard about last year’s success of this budding food festival, entirely dedicated to the history and culture of Mortadella, you’ll want to keep the 9^th-12^th of October free. During its first four-day sojourn, MortadellaBò drew 100,000 visitors – and for good reason:...

Bologna has been rated Italy’s third most livable city – a good seven spots up from where it was last year.

These results, from the Italian financial newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore’s annual survey, provide a snapshot of the country based on 36 different indicators. This is yet another authoritative affirmation that Bologna is among Europe’s most culturally interesting cities, not to mention...

The sun shines in Italy in March. Mimosa trees are out, and wild cherries, too. At this time of year, shop windows are piled high with exquisitely wrapped, dove-shaped Easter Panettone and glittery heaps of eggs alongside the everyday temptations of whole prosciuttos, wheels of parmesan and feather light patisseries.

There is a little Zion in the heart of Bologna. It is the basilica of San Stefano, which for more than a thousand years has been known as the ‘sancta Jerusalem Bononiensis’ – Bologna’s holy Jerusalem. You approach along a portico that is topped with a row of beautifully carved heads, all of them bowed as if in prayer. Where the portico ends the road opens out into a long isosceles triangle,...

Digital origins: born in an era in which the digital culture is truly under our skin, no unease when manipulating and interacting with any digital technology. Gerry, my Dutch nephew, can’t speak yet, but plays with the computer and interacts with it perfectly. Late contemporary: I, born in an era in which the culture of contemporary art should be under my skin, and to which I arrived late:...