The second issue Now-Here-Land invites us to imagine collective, inclusive and aware urban futures
News
Editorial
Issue 2: Now-Here-Land
Date
21 April 2026
The second issue of Notes on Plural Intelligences explores what cities mean today. It reflects on the many ways of belonging to contemporary urban spaces—places (or non‑places) where systems of movement, data and control coexist. In this context, the body becomes the first affected by housing policies and legislative frameworks under pressure from today’s turbo‑capitalist system.
To approach this shift in perspective, Benedetta Lenzi conversates with Dario Bartolini, architect, artist and member of the radical collective Archizoom Associati. In the interview, Dario invites us to stay in the present, observe what surrounds us and act consciously. The issue also presents Fare Posto, a project developed by students of the MA in Interior Design, promoted by Fondazione Francesco Morelli. Coordinated by Davide Fabio Colaci and Riccardo Ferri, the project proposes three mobile and flexible furniture solutions designed for the primary access point for social and health services Centro Sammartini of the Comune di Milano.
We invite you to take a walk with Cecilia Alemani, curator of New York City’s High Line, to discuss what it means to transform a city into an urban art gallery. On the occasion of her visit to Casa IED NYC in March, she reflects on the relationship between art, the urban environment and the multiple species that inhabit it. Continuing this focus on design for the more‑than‑human, we interview Alessandra Covini and Giovanni Bellotti of Studio Ossidiana, who propose a radical empathetic reflection before any design project.
The Visual Essay is by IED lecturer and PhD candidate Chiara Grandesso, who expresses the desires, conflicts and contradictions of urban spaces and its inhabitants through a selection of our student projects.
The journey ends with Julia González Saiz, a graduate of IED Kunsthal Bilbao, with her final project The Ground Disappearing Beneath Our Feet [El suelo que desaparece bajo nuestros pies]. In her essay, she draws on thoughts and quotes from various authors to offer a fresh perspective on what it means to walk through the city, analysing the concept of flânerie—introduced by Walter Benjamin—from a female perspective. The result of her project, which seeks to recover the memory of forgotten bodies —especially those of women—, took the form of a book and an audiovisual work on walking, memory and urban space, framed by a conversation with her grandmother.
Will you miss it? Discover it here.
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