Biographical notes

Diego Gabasio graduated in Business and Institutional Communication at University of Turin is responsible for Marketing and Communications of FIR ITALIA. In 2006 he started working for FIR ITALIA, a historical brand in the field of mixer taps for bathrooms and kitchens, holding roles with increasing responsibilities first in operational marketing and then in strategic marketing. Currently he coordinates an important corporate rebranding project, with new brand positioning and communication strategy.

Biographical notes

Born in Matera in 1961. Graduated in architecture at the University of Florence, Pietro Gaeta started his professional career as the assistant of Alessandro Mendini, and collaborated to many professional design and architecture projects, amongst which: “Casa Antonello” in Milan, Holland’s Groninger Museum, the Muesum of  Merone, “Urban Flower” a square in Toyama ( Japan), Guglielmo Tabacchi’s Gallery and the exhibition “L’entrange Univers de Carlo Mollino” at the Centre George Pompidou in Paris.
He opens his studio N.O.W. Architecture & Design Lab in Milan. The projects he develops range from architecture and interior design to industrial design.  He took part in a number of exhibitions in Italy and abroad. In 2010 he create the brand N.O.W. editions, producing limited edition furniture pieces, surfaces and custom wall papers.

Antón García-Abril, (Madrid, 1969) is a European PhD Architect, full-professor at the School of Architecture and Planning of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.), and he is currently developing a second doctoral thesis about “Stressed Mass” at the School of Civil Engineering of the Polytechnic University of Barcelona. He received the Spanish Academy Research Prize in Rome in 1996. He has been associate professor at the School of Architecture of the Polytechnic University of Madrid (E.T.S.A.M.-U.P.M.) for a decade, invited professor at the Graduate School of Design of Harvard University in 2010 and Cornell University in 2008, and visiting critic and lecturer in different universities and institutions in America and Europe, being the most recent ones the Akademie der Bildenden Künste Stuttgart, Kunstakademie of Düsseldorf, AA London, Instituto Cervantes Chicago, Bienne Forum de l’Architecture, University of Texas at San Antonio, Bauhaus University Weimar, the ETH Zürich, Princeton University, Harbin Institute of Technology China, ZA 2010 Congress, Johannesburgo, Sudafric, Accademia d’Architettura of Mendrisio, or the College of Architects of Ecuador in Quito. In 2000 he establishes ENSAMBLE STUDIO leading, together with his partner Débora Mesa, a cross-functional team with a solid research background on the lookout for new approaches to architectonical space, building technologies and urban strategies. Their built projects are exposed structures that explore the essence of materials to create space. The Music Studies Center and the SGAE Central Office in Santiago de Compostela, the Martemar House in Malaga, the Hemeroscopium House in Madrid, The Truffle in Costa da Morte (Spain) and more recently the Reader’s House in Madrid and the Cervantes Theater in Mexico City have been internationally published. Their office has been awarded with important prizes like The Rice Design Alliance Prize to emerging architects in 2009 or the Architectural Record Design Vanguard Prize in 2005, and was selected by SANAA to participate in the Venice Biennale of Architecture 2010. This year Antón has been elected an International Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) for his services to international architecture, and has been curator of the Spanish Pavilion at the Venice Biennale presenting “Spainlab”. Beside his professional career, he keeps a strong involvement with the academic community through teaching and research. He co-founded with Débora Mesa the Positive City Foundation in 2009, with the aim of forwarding their views on urban development, and they are in the process of setting up a research laboratory at MIT, the POPLab (Prototypes of Prefabrication Laboratory).

Biographical notes

Massimo Giacon was born in Padua in 1961. Since 1980 he has been working in Milan as a cartoonist, illustrator, designer, artist and musician. In the early 1980s he was involved in the renaissance of Italian comics led by magazines such as Frigidaire, Alter, Dolce Vita, Cyborg and Nova Express, then in 1985 he began working with the architecture practice Sottsass Associati. He continued his design work through collaborations with Matteo Thun, Studio Mendini and Sieger design and projects for Olivetti, Memphis, Artemide, Alessi, Swatch, Philips, Ritzenhoff and Telecom. In 1990 he embarked on an artistic career that led to numerous personal and collective exhibitions in Italy, Switzerland, America, Greece, Portugal and Germany. In 1994 he began working in the field of graphic design for computer networks, websites and CD-ROMs. After a decade of musical activity with a number of different groups, in 1996 he released his debut solo album entitled Horror Vacui, followed in 2003 by a second entitled Nella città Ideale. He has also designed tapestries, rugs, ceramics and kitchen items, produced advertising illustrations, collaborated with fashion designers and magazines (Romeo Gigli, Elle, Glamour), and created installations for international exhibitions and TV animations.
He teaches at the Istituto Europeo di Design in Milan.
Since 2008 he has been working on a limited edition of sculptures entitled “The Pop Will Eat Himself” for Super-Ego.
In 2011 he published “La quarta necessità” to a text by Daniele Luttazzi (Rizzoli Lizard Ed.), then in 2014 “Il Mondo così Com’è“, based on a script by Tiziano Scarpa (Rizzoli Lizard Ed.). In September 2015 he is due to publish Ettore, a comic book about Ettore Sottsass (Il Sole 24 Ore Cultura).
He is currently working on several items for Alessi, drawing comic strips and graphic novels (for Rizzoli-Lizard and Il Sole 24 Ore Cultura) and continuing his artistic and performance work.

Biographical notes
With a Master of Architecture degree at Politecnico di Milano, Gianni qualified as member of the ARB and RIBA in 2013, thanks to his experiences in New York, with Studio Daniel Libeskind, and in London, with Zaha Hadid Architects. 
Gianni gained a first-hand knowledge and developed an expertise in the use of parametric and computational design and in creating architectural elements using non-conventional methods of design. Beyond his professional boundaries, this expertise and desire for further enlightenment on the multifaceted nature of computation design led him to establish a dedicated forum to create a platform for people in diverse paths of life (visual arts, performing arts, mathematics, engineering, chemistry, physics, materials science and of course computer science) to exchange ideas and present their works and ideas. 
He joined Pininfarina in 2014 and has since been leading multiple projects ranging from the cultural, infrastructural and residential to the commercial, in Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Australia. His mission is to lead the innovation drive both in the creative processes and in the final design, reimagining the future with the multidisciplinary approach and insurgent mindset of his internal team and the coordination of external teams. An example of this kind of project is the Istanbul Air Traffic Control Tower and Technical Building which he recently coordinated. 
His role as lead architect within the company entails growing the company business seeking the best opportunities through the liaisons with clients, teams and contractors, thus establishing its design leadership. 

Biographical notes
Sean Godsell was born in Melbourne in 1960. He graduated with First Class Honours from The University of Melbourne in 1984. He spent much of 1985 travelling in Japan and Europe and worked in London from 1986 to 1988 for Sir Denys Lasdun. In 1989 he returned to Melbourne and worked for The Hassell Group. In 1994 he formed Godsell Associates Pty Ltd Architects.
He obtained a Masters of Architecture degree from RMIT University in 1999 entitled ‘The Appropriateness of the Contemporary Australian Dwelling.’ His work has been published in the world’s leading Architectural journals including Architectural Review (UK) Architectural Record (USA) Domus (Italy) A+U (Japan) Casabella (Italy) GA Houses (Japan) Detail (Germany) Le Moniteur (France) and Architect (Portugal).
In July 2002 the influential English design magazine Wallpaper listed him as one of ten people destined to ‘change the way we live’. He was the only Australian and the only Architect in the group.
He has lectured in the USA, UK, China, Japan, India, France and New Zealand as well as across Australia. He was a keynote speaker at the Alvar Aalto symposium in Finland in July 2006.
In July 2003 he received a Citation from the President of the American Institute of Architects for his work for the homeless. His Future Shack prototype was exhibited from May to October 2004 at the Smithsonian Institute’s Cooper Hewitt Design Museum in New York. In the same year the Italian publisher Electa published the monograph Sean Godsell: Works and Projects. Time Magazine named him in the ‘Who’s Who -The New Contemporaries’ section of their 2005 Style and Design supplement. He was the only Australian and the only Architect in the group of seven eminent designers.
He has received numerous local and international awards. In 2006 he received the Victorian Premier’sDesign Award and the RAIA Robin Boyd Award and in 2007 he received the Cappochin residential architecture award in Italy and a Chicago Athenaeum award in theUSA – all for St Andrew’s “Beach House and in 2008” he was a finalist in the Wallpaper InternationalDesign Awards and a recipient of his second AIA Record Houses Award for Excellence in the USA for Glenburn
House. In 2008 noted architectural historian and Professor of Architecture at Columbia University Kenneth Frampton nominated him for the inaugural BSI Swiss Architecture Award for architects under the age of 50 and his work was exhibited as part of the Milan Triennale and Venice Biennale in the same year. In 2010 the prototype of the RMIT design Hub façade was exhibited in Gallery MA in Tokyo before being transported in 2011 to its permanent home at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. In 2012 he was shortlisted to design the new Australian Pavilion in Venice.
In January 2013 the Spanish publication El Croquis published the monograph Sean Godsell Tough Subtlety which includes an essay by Juhani Pallasmaa and interview by Leon Van Schaik. In July 2013 he was visiting professor at the IUAV WAVE workshop in Venice and delivered the UNESCO chair open lecture in Mantova, Italy.

Biographical notes
Elena Granata, professor of Urban Planning at the Polytechnic of Milan, vice-president of the School of Civil Economy. Member of the Sherpa Staff, Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri, G7/G20 (2020-21). Founder of PLANET B, a research group on urban, environmental and civil economy regeneration. Articles and research on the city, environment and territory are collected on www.planetB.it. Her recent books: Il senso delle donne per la città (Einaudi, 2023); Ecolove (ed. Ambiente, 2022), con Fiore de Lettera; Placemaker. Gli inventori dei luoghi che abiteremo (Einaudi, 2021); Biodivercity (Giunti, 2019). 

Biographical notes
After graduating, she taught alongside Prof. Franco Minissi on the Restoration course at the University of Rome La Sapienza. In 1980, she moved to Turin where she collaborated with Fiat Engineering on the project for the redevelopment of historic town centres in the Basilicata region. In 1986 she moved to Sicily, where she has lived ever since. She won the RIBA Awards/EU in 2005 and 2012. In 2012, she was awarded the Milan Triennale Gold Medal for Lifetime Achievement. In 2008, she was one of the five architects invited to participate in the competition for the curatorship and design of the Italian Pavilion at the 11th Venice Biennale of Architecture. In 2016, the jury of the 15th Venice Biennale of Architecture awarded her a Special Mention for the installation Onore Perduto (“Lost Honour”) with which she participated in the exhibition “Reporting from the front” curated by Alejandro Aravena. In 2018, she participated in the FREESPACE exhibition curated by Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara at the 16th Venice Biennale of Architecture. In 2019, she was awarded an honorary degree in Building Engineering - Architecture by the University of Catania. In 2021 she won the INARCH National Lifetime Achievement Award, joined the National Academy of San Luca and won the Italian Architecture Award for the best building assigned by Milan Triennale and MAXXI.