My mother’s family were from Puglia, so I was interested to see this region in the spotlight last month, when Italy hosted the G7 summit at the elegant Borgo (Italian for ‘village’) Egnazia.
The Puglia coast, on the eastern heel of Italy’s boot, is less well-known than the Amalfi coastline, but it has seen a surge in tourism in recent years.
The spectacular Grotta Palazzese restaurant, built into a cave overlooking the emerald waters of the Adriatic, is now Instagram-famous, as are the region’s four UNESCO world heritage sites.
The pretty port city of Bari is also becoming more popular with holidaymakers. Bari is also a university town, and home to one of my clients, 3D stone processing experts CNC Design.
A few years ago I interpreted for a professor at the Politecnico di Bari, Giuseppe Fallacara, when he gave a fascinating lecture for CNC at Foster & Partners about stereotomy, the science of cutting solids into particular shapes.
Foster & Partners have used the centuries-old principles of stereotomy in some of its iconic buildings such as the Crossrail roof in Canary Wharf and the Reichstag dome in Berlin.
Learning about niche subjects like this is one of the things I love about my job. I specialise in the business, legal, banking & finance and medical sectors, as well as European Works Council events – but I have interpreted a huge variety of other subjects during my twenty-year career.