Published on Wednesday, June 3, 2015 by Kathy McCabe Last week, the exhibit Pompeii and Europe: 1748-1943 opened at the National Archaeological Museum of Naples, in collaboration with the Pompeii archaeological site.  A noteworthy portion of the exhibit will be 86 plaster casts painstakingly restored from the ash-encased human remains recovered from Pompeii in 1863. The 79 A.D. eruption of Mount Vesuvius resulted in...

Published on Tuesday, May 26, 2015 by Kathy McCabe If you’ve ever wished you could travel in a time machine, Duke University researchers are about to grant that wish. At the end of May, the Museo Civica Reggio Emilia will debut an exhibit that allows visitors to see what Reggio Emilia, a town in the region of Emilia-Romagna,  would have looked and felt like 2,000 years ago. That’s right, looked and felt—beca...

Published on Wednesday, May 20, 2015 by Kathy McCabe The final episode of AMC’s celebrated series Mad Men  had its finale in an iconic cultural moment that was filmed, not in California (as you might believe), but on a hilltop near Rome! The 1971 Coca-Cola television commercial in which people from around the world sang a jingle about love and harmony was actually produced, not by the fictional Don Draper, but by a...

Published on Friday, May 15, 2015 by Kathy McCabe The International Foundation for Environmental Education (FEE) has once again given Italy the highest number of Blue Flag beaches, bringing Italy's total to 280. The Blue Flag designation means that a beach meets the organization’s high eco-standards for cleanliness and sustainability. FEE Italy President Claudio Mazza says that the constant increase, up from 248...

Published on Tuesday, May 12, 2015 by Kathy McCabe Italy and ancient architecture go together like pasta and marinara sauce—but as frequent travelers know, not all ancient architecture in Italy was built by its natives. The ruins at Paestum on the Tyrrhenian Sea were once a major Greek city; now the area’s three beautifully preserved Greek temples provide testament to the place known as “Poseidonia” in the fif...

Published on Tuesday, May 5, 2015 by Kathy McCabe Visitors to Rome's Colosseum will once again be able to walk in the footsteps of the gladiators. Minister of Culture Dario Franceschini announced that he will approve putting the floor back in the iconic amphitheater. "Rebuilding the arena of the Colosseum, taking it back to the way it was until the 19th century, is the best way to protect the monument," Franceschi...

Published on Sunday, May 3, 2015 by Kathy McCabe Stars are twinkling brightly in Italy right now—at least stars of the movie variety. Tom Hanks, Tom Cruise and Justin Bieber are all in country this week, and giving the paparazzi plenty of photo opps. Bieber, the new kid on these cobblestoned streets, plays a male model in Ben Stiller’s Zoolander 2, in which Owen Wilson, Will Ferrell, and Christine Taylor (Mrs...

Published on Monday, April 27, 2015 by Kathy McCabe Back in elementary school, you may have used a lemon from your mother’s kitchen to make a simple battery that could power a single lightbulb. Now, imagine if you could use lemons to light up your entire neighborhood: In Sicily, the region’s massive amount of citrus waste (rinds, pulp, seeds) is being used to power a generator that can provide electricity to 333 ho...

Published on Friday, April 24, 2015 by Kathy McCabe Via Urbana, a quiet cobblestone street, will be the first car-free street in Rome after a municipal council vote to make the street a wholly pedestrian area. Anyone who has ever visited The Eternal City will testify to its eternal din from scooters, cabs and honking cars of all shapes and sizes. But the noise is a secondary ill; the real problem is safety, since agg...

Published on Monday, April 20, 2015 by Kathy McCabe In May, Expo Milano will open its doors and not close them until October. It’s been a long journey for the northern Italian city to get ready for this huge international event, and as spring begins, the Milanese are busy putting the final touches on Expo locations, as well as making sure their own monuments, buildings, parks, and institutions are shown in the best l...