casement windows

Casement windows always look charmingly European . . .




. . . especially on a Spanish-influenced apartment building.

The only drawback to casement windows is that you usually have to forego screens, I think. In Italy the windows never have screens, which Americans usually find inexplicable. I think they tend to be quite expensive because windows don't come in standard sizes there, given the long and varied architectural history. But I'm just guessing.

the Modern Wing of the Art Institute

People generally don't go to Rome to see contemporary architecture. But there are a few notable examples, such as Italian architect Renzo Piano's Parco della Musica, an opera house in the north of Rome. Piano is also the architect of the new Modern Wing of the Art Institute of Chicago, which just opened to the public this month. The lines of the structure are admittedly not ones often associated with the popular notion of "Italy," but the notion of harmony and beauty with surroundings are.