Ivrea, industrial city of the 20th century

I worked there in the late 1980ies while Olivetti was still going strong and loved the place.

The Arduino is from Ivrea, it rose from the ruins of Olivetti, so to speak.

If you visit Italy and are interested in this kind of architecture you should also visit Crespi d'Adda [1] a couple of hours of car to the East of Ivrea, past Milan. That's another UNESCO site and was created for the workers of the local textile factory. When you're there you should also hike the Adda river to the north, some hydroelectric power stations from 100+ years ago, nice sightseeing and some Leonardo da Vinci's works of engineering.

[1] https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/730

After misreading a section which talked of Italian rationalism and not nationalism, I went searching. An industrialist in Italy in the 1930’s would surely have had an interesting relationship with the government, especially given his seemingly socialist politics.

He did.

https://media.nature.com/original/magazine-assets/d41586-019...

Edit: some of those houses and rooms put more recent design to shame. They look practical, light and beautiful.

Europe has paid a high price for neglecting its manufacturing base. Asking it to do the impossible, producing at chinese prices under heavy regulation and high salaries.

can't help but think the remaining days of google arts and culture aren't many. if they killed code jam and gutted the open source team to save a few bucks i can't imagine ruth will let this continue.