Here and now.

Conversations between Francesco Dal Co and Toyo Ito, Renzo Piano, Smiljan Radic, Norman Foster, Eduardo Souto De Moura and Frank Gehry.

The current health emergency has brought most professional activities to a standstill, forcing us to stay at home without the opportunity to travel and in many cases even to work. We live in a suspended, unfamiliar time, a fragile, hyperconnected period in which every action takes place in the here and now, in the immediacy of the present. Taking our cue from the book Here and Now: Letters 2008-2011 based on the correspondence between Paul Auster and J.M. Coetzee, we asked Francesco Dal Co, editor-in-chief of Casabella, to share with us a series of informal conversations with his architect friends about the situation we are facing today.

In keeping with the fast-moving digital age, instead of letters written on an old Olivetti Lettera 22 typewriter as in the case of the two acclaimed novelists, the exchange takes the form of six video conversations with well-known architects. From a magnificently empty Venice, Francesco Dal Co discusses the current situation caused by the pandemic with famous designers located all over the world: Renzo Piano in Paris, Norman Foster in Switzerland, Toyo Ito in Tokyo, Frank Gehry in Los Angeles, Smiljan Radic in Santiago de Chile, and Eduardo Souto de Moura in Porto.

While these spontaneous and fascinating conversations focus principally on architecture and design, they also explore related fields and offer unique insights into the contemporary world.