Studio Forbes - Blog

You Can Take the Heat

I’ve been trying to avoid discussions of the recession in the Studio Forbes newsletter. There is more than enough gloom and doom coming at us from the mainstream media. So I’ve been looking around for optimistic stories to cover. Where do you see people really enjoying themselves even though their disposable income may have completely disappeared? What looks and feels happy out there on the streets and in our communities? At the top of my list are the ‘bike kitchens’ that can now be found in most of our cities.

Pisa and Pedestrians

Tourists flock to Pisa to see the quirky and charming tower that has gone askew. Even more askew, it seems to me, is the groundcover throughout the city. In the piazza adjacent to the Tower as well as elsewhere throughout Pisa, the historic tile and stone walkways have been covered in asphalt, turning much of the city into a dark grey cheerless space. One of the reasons Italy is so darn charming is the pervasiveness of cobblestone streets and public spaces and the abundance of diverse stone and tile surfaces.