Biographical notes
Giovanni Chiaramonte was born in Varese in 1948. His work largely explores the relationship between place and destiny in western civilisation and has been exhibited at the Gropius Bau in Berlin, the Deutsches Architekturmuseum in Frankfurt, the Museum of Modern Art in Caracas, the Venice Biennale, the Milan Triennale, the CCA in Montreal, the Hunter College gallery in New York and the Shanghai Expo.
His publications include: Giardini e paesaggi, 1983; Terra del ritorno, 1989; Penisola delle figure, 1993; Westwards, 1996; Milano. Cerchi della città di mezzo, 2000; In corso d’opera, 2000; Pellegrinaggi occidentali, 2000; Frammenti dalla Rocca, 2002; Abitare il mondo. Europe, 2004; Berlin. Figure, 2004; Attraverso la pianura, 2005; Senza foce, 2005; Come un enigma_Venezia (Like an Enigma. Venice), 2006; Nascosto in prospettiva (Hidden in Perspective), 2007; In Berlin, 2009; L’altro_Nei volti nei luoghi, 2010-2011; E.I.A.E., 2012; Via Fausta, 2012; Interno perduto, 2012; Inscape_Piccola creazione, 2012; Jerusalem_Figure della promessa, 2014; A medida do Ocidente (The Measure of the West), with A. Siza, 2015; The Evolving European City, 2015; Ultima Sicilia, 2016.
Chiaramonte has founded and edited series of photographic books for Jaca Book, Federico Motta Editore, S.E.I., Edizioni della Meridiana and Ultreya/Itaca. His critical contributions include: Luogo e identità nella Fotografia Europea Contemporanea e Nuova Fotografia Inglese 1983, Paolo Monti 1985, Ikko Narahara 1993, Luigi Ghirri 1997, Andrej Tarkovskij 2002, Mario Carrieri 2004, Robert Adams 2008, Joel Meyerowitz 2013.
He teaches History and Theory of Photography at the IULM University and NABA Academy in Milan.

Biographical notes

Mario Cucinella, Hon FAIA, Int. Fellow RIBA, took a degree in architecture at the University of Genoa in 1986, and from 1987 to 1992 he worked with Renzo Piano at the Renzo Piano Building Workshop, in the offices of Genoa and Paris. He established Mario Cucinella Architects in Paris in 1992 and in 1999 in Bologna, where MCA is now located. From 1998 to 2006 he was a professor at the Laboratory of Architecture Technology of the Faculty of Architecture in Ferrara, and since 2004 he has been an Honorary Professor at Nottingham University in England.
In 2013 he was Guest Professor in Emergency Technologies at the Technische Universitat of Munich, and in 2014 he was visiting professor at the Faculty of Architecture Federico II in Naples. He is currently director of the Scientific Committee of PLEA (Passive and Low Energy Architecture). In 2016 the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) assigned to an International Fellowship. In 2017 the American Institute of Architects (AIA) assigned him the prestigious Honorary Fellowship Award. He is the curator of the Italian Pavilion for the Venice Architecture Biennale 2018. In January 2012, he established Building Green Futures: a non.profit organization whose objective is to combine environmental culture and technology to recreate architecture that ensures dignity, quality and performance while respecting the environment.
In 2014 he worked as a tutor together with Renzo Piano on the G124 project for the recovery of suburbs in Italy. He established SOS – School of Sustainability in Bologna in 2015, a postgraduate school aimed at training professionals in the field of sustainability.

Biographical notes

Cesare Maria Casati was born in Milan in 1936 where he studied architecture and in 1960 he joined Gio Ponti’s studio, who immediately involved him in the editing of “Domus” magazine (Editoriale Domus), becoming later its responsible director until June 1979.
From January 1981 he became editor of the magazine "La Mia Casa" (Peruzzo Editore) until June 1985.
In February 1986 he founded the magazine “l’Arca”, international magazine of architecture, design and visual communication, and becomes its responsible director.
In 1985 he was in charge of the interior fittings project of the European Community Pavilion at Tzukuba Expo.
In 1986, 1988 and 1992 realizes the projects of the interior design of the Italian Pavilion at the Expos of Vancouver, Brisbane and Seville.
Later, in 1995, he also became the director of “l’Arca International”, the trilingual version of “l’Arca” edited by MDO in the Principality of Monaco.
From 2004 to 2010 he was appointed professor at the Faculty of Architecture in Valle Giulia (Rome) in the Interior Architecture degree course.
Professor in the Master of interior architecture at the Faculty of Architecture in Valle Giulia (Rome).
His design works are exhibited at the Museum Modern Art in New York.
His architectural and interior projects have been realized in different places in the world (see the book published by l’Arca International: "From 1960 ...").
He has been a jury member in various international competitions, awards and events and speaker at various conferences worldwide.

Biographical notes

Benedetto Camerana is an architect, landscape architect, and holds a PhD in
History of Architecture and Urbanism. He was the director of the magazines “Eden.
Architecture in the landscape” from 1993 to 1997 and “Landscape Architecture” from
2001 to 2005. He was a speaker at the XXIII UIA World Congress of Architecture 2008.
He is also a member of the Board of Directors of Palazzo Grassi in Venice from 1996
to 2005. Since 2012, he is President of the National Automobile Museum, and since
2013 President of the Lingotto consortium in Turin. From 2015 he is a member of the
Metaphisical Club of the Domus Academy in Milan.

Biographical notes

Born in Lima, Peru, 1963. Formed as an architect in Lima and in Milan.
Master degree in Landscape and Territory at the UDP, Chile.
Director of the Master Program in Architecture at the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú.
Design Critic at Harvard GSD (2015), and teacher at the Paris-Belleville School of Architecture, from 1999 to 2006.
Advisor for Peru at the MoMA exhibition “Latin America in Construction: Architecture 1955-1980”, New York, 2015.
Member of the jury for the Mies Crown Hall Architecture Prize, Chicago, 2016.
Jean Pierre was curator, along with Sandra, of the Peruvian Pavilion at the 15th Venice Biennale, 2016, which obtained the Special Mention of the Jury.

biographical notes
Maria Claudia Clemente (1967) graduated from ‘La Sapienza’ in Rome in 1992 and received her PhD from the Faculty of Architecture there in 1995. Since 2001 she has been a researcher at the same university where, since 2003, she has also been responsible for a design studio investigating in particular Design for Public Spaces. In 2003, 2008, 2011 and 2014 Maria Claudia served as a visiting critic at Cornell University in Rome and Ithaca, New York.

In 2002 Maria Claudia Clemente founded Labics together with Francesco Isidori.
Labics is an office of architecture and urban planning; combining the theoretical approach with applied research, the field of interest of the office extends from the the interior design to the scale of urban masterplans, going through the different scales and complexities of the project.
Labics has won several national and international competitions, among which we must remember the MAST in Bologna (2006) and "Città del Sole" in Rome (2007). Recently Labics has taken an honourable mention at the competition for the Guggenheim Museum in Helsinki among more than 1.700 participants, has been mentioned at the Klekovaca Tourist Centre competition in Bosnia and has been selected among the six finalist in the second phase of the international competition Progetto Flaminio in Roma. Since 2003 to 2014 the office has been responsible for the general concept, interior design and architecture of Obikà, an international chain of bars and restaurant.
Labics received different international awards like Iconic Award, the Chicago Athenaeum, Inarch-Ance and Dedalo Minosse; in 2015 MAST has been selected for the Mies van der Rohe Award. Labics has been invited to participate to several exhibitions, among which the 11°, 12° and 14° Venice Architectural Biennale and the recent “Make city” festival in Berlino (2015). Most of the projects have been published in national and international reviews.

Biographical notes

Columnist for the magazine “il Bagno Oggi e Domani” of which he was co-founder and editorial director.
He is been part for about 16 years of the ADI’s Permanent Observatory of Design. From 2008 to 2010 he directed the selection and publication on the ADI-Design-Index of the best products and services among which the winners of the “Compasso d’Oro” are selected.
He held many conferences and talks with students in various universities and he is often moderator for conventions and seminars about interior design and industrial design.

Biographical notes

Javier Corvalán was born in Asunción, Paraguay on 30 June 1962. He studied architecture at the Faculty of Science and Technology of UCA from 1981 to 1987. He moved to Rome to pursue a doctorate in Redevelopment of urban centres and in 1990 began working as a freelancer with his own studio. He has won numerous competitions for public and private projects, both individually and as an associate. Notable examples include the experimental theatre at the Manzana de la Rivera architectural complex, the municipal theatre in Asunción and the Centro Cultural de España. He was a finalist at the Ibero-American Architecture and Urban Design Biennial in 2002 and 2004. In 2000 he won the Contemporary Architecture award and set up the Architecture Workshop currently located in the city of Luque. He works as a post-graduate lecturer at various schools of architecture in Latin America and is a visiting professor at the Institute of Architecture and Urban Design in Venice, Italy. 
In Asunción he teaches at Taller E of FADA UNA, which he founded, and is thesis professor at the Faculty of Science and Technology of UCA.

Biographical notes
Graduated Architect since 2001 from Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (Spain). She is driving her own office since 2001 in Madrid. She has a long and deep experience in education. She is Senior Teaching Fellow and Researcher in Barlett School of Architecture (UCL London, UK). She has also teached in Ecole Special (Paris, France) and in HEAD University (Geneva, Switzerland). She was Studio Professor in the University of Alicante (Escuela de Arquitectura Universidad de Alicante) from 2002 to 2007 and she is at the moment in Madrid University (Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Spain) and in Instituto de Empresa (Madrid, Spain). Her designer activity is acompanied by a research project called “Social and Aesthetic Repercussions of technical topics and solutions which take ecology into account” and that has taken her as visitting scholar to Columbia University in New York (2002), Ecole de Mines de Paris (2003) and Princeton University in New Jersey (2004) and also to the Institut d´Arquitectura Avancada de Catalunya (Barcelona), in a Postgraduate Master (2003-2007).

As speaker she has participated in forum, lectures and debates in more than 80 international destinies and more than 90 different magazines and publications has talked about the proposals from her office. Her work has taken part of the exhibitions in 8ª Biennale di Venezia, 10ª Biennale di Venezia, V Bienal de Arquitectura y Diseño de Sao Paulo in traveling exhibitions as New Trends Europe-Asia, Panorama Emergente Iberoamericano or Europan 7 and in different museums and LIGA (México DF), Galeries including Gallery “mad is mad” (Madrid), Arquerias de Nuevos Ministerios del Ministerio de la Vivienda (Madrid), la Casa Encendida (Madrid), Museo de Teruel (Teruel) and several Profesional Associations for Architects in Spain and several Universities in the same Country. She is at the moment supervising construction of her project for a Mediatheque in Garcimuñoz Medieval Casttle in Cuenca, Spain (a public cultural building including the refurnishment of the existing infrastructures with social purposes); the refurbishment of a Vernacular house in Toledo, Spain; and other smaller projects. She is also involved in the design of digital interactive exhibitions with social purpose like encourage the reading between young children (Fairytale Park Museography in Málaga) or appreciating the effort after some sports (Centro de Arte Canal).

As an architect, she claims for a strong compromise with innovation. In her project she proposes multidisciplinary exercises in which, through ecology, sociology or science, architecture goes beyond stylistic distinctions and meets again the complexity of real life in our contemporary world. She has won more than 20 different prizes in professional competitions. Some of these awards follows:

2001: First Prize for the UNED Pavilion Competition in Madrid Book Fair.

2003: First Prize, Europan 7 Competition, Site: Santiago de Compostela.

2006: Third Prize, "Contemporary Art Centre Competition, ARCO Collection, Matadero of Madrid”.

2007: Second Prize in the Competition “Pavilion of Spain at the Shanghai Expo 2010”.

2010: Runner Up in the Competition “Extension of the Museum of Modern Art in Medellín”, Medellín, Colombia.

2013 Honourable Mention in the ArcVision Prize – Woman and Architecture

Biographical notes
1972 He graduated in Architecture from Milan Polytechnic.
1972 -1984 He founded and directed CentroKappa, a multidisciplinary consulting firm in the field of business communication. During this period he collaborated with a number of young designers at Centrokappa including Michele De lucchi, Alberto Meda, Paola Navone and Franco Raggi.
1977 He invented the name and brand Flou, remaining its art director until 2005.
1977   Together with Alessandro Mendini he founded the design magazine Modo, filling the role of art director for five years.
1979 With Centrokappa he won the Compasso d’oro award for design research and promotion of Italian design.
1983  Together with Maria Grazia Mazzocchi and Alessandro Guerriero he founded the first postgraduate design school Domus Academy.

1984- 2006 Partner and CEO of Garage, one of the most highly acclaimed communication and multimedia event companies in Italy.

1995-2000  In parallel with his work at Garage, he was a founding partner and chairman of Orchestra, one of the leading new Italian media agencies. The company was sold at its peak to Inferentia Group, which immediately afterwards was launched on the stock market in the new economy list.

2001-2003  CEO of Domus Academy, the school he had founded twenty years earlier.
1999- 2010 Together with Kartell and Finartemide, he founded Design-Italia spa for the construction of the first Internet Portal devoted to Italian design, serving as CEO and Editor.

2004-2008  He worked as art director for Olivetti, in charge of new product and corporate identity design. His machine design team included a number of leading international designers such as Ideo, James Irvine, Alberto Meda, Jasper Morrison and Francisco Gomez Paz.

since 2006 He founded the Design Library, the first library entirely devoted to design.

Today he continues his activities as cultural director of the Design Library. He also works as a freelance design management consultant for design-driven companies and institutions.

Biographical notes
João Luís Carrilho da Graça, architect, graduated from Escola Superior de Belas Artes de Lisboa in 1977, the year he initiated his professional practice.
Lecturer at the School of Architecture of the Technical University of Lisbon between 1977 and 1992. Professor at the Universidade Autónoma de Lisboa from 2001 to 2010 and at the Universidade de Évora since 2005. Hheaded the architecture department at both institutions until 2010. Guest lecturer at the Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura de la Universidad de Navarra in 2005, 2007 and 2010. Invited to lecture in seminars and conferences at several international universities and institutions.

His body of work has been recognized with several awards, including: the title of “Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres” by the French Republic in 2010; the “Prémio Pessoa” in 2008, the “Luzboa” Award in 2004 at Lisbon’s first International Light Art Biennale, the “order of merit” by the Portuguese Republic in 1999 and the “Aica Award” by the International Association of Art Critics in 1992.

Distinguished with the “AIT Aaward 2012 - transportation” for the pedestrian bridge over the Carpinteira stream, the “Piranesi Prix de Rome” prize in 2010 for the musealization of the “Praça Nova” archeological site at “Castelo de São Jorge”, the “FAD” prize in 1999 and the “Valmor” prize in 1998 for the knowledge of the seas pavilion at Lisbon Expo ’98; the “Secil” prize in 1994 for the Higher School of Social Communication (Instituto Politécnico de Lisboa), and nominations for the “Mies Van Der Rohe” European Architecture Award in 1990, 1992, 1994, 2009, 2010 and 2011, the latter for both the pedestrian bridge over the Carpinteira stream and the musealization of the “Praça Nova” archeological site at “Castelo de São Jorge”.

In 2010 the project Candeias’ House was part of the Portuguese official representation, “no place like - 4 houses 4 films”, at the 12th international architecture exhibition - la Biennale di Venezia “people meet in architecture”.