(April 2011) The Swiss construction industry is booming, according to the trade publication „Stein“ (German). Private homes, particularly in the higher to luxury class, are in great demand. The reason lies in the relocation of international companies whose employees seek appropriate housing.

The book „Stone in Architecture“ is an English digest of scientific standards and the effects of environmental conditions on natural stone.

Gabion lighting by Italian Leonardo Luce (Italian).

Historic reports of ancient quarries tell of splitting stone by means of wooden wedges swelled with water. French scientists tested the method. Results were published in the trade journal „Pierre Actual“ (December 2010) which can be purchased for 11 €.

An overview of literature on Egyptian quarries from 2007 to 2010 is available on Per Storemyr’s blog.

A stone planet 1.4 x the mass of planet Earth was discovered by NASA near Kepler-10. Its size could sustain life forms but being 20 x closer to its sun than Mercury is to our own sun, makes sustainability of life there seem unlikely.

After the museum forbade blind sculptor Felice Tagliaferri to touch Naples’ famous „Christo Velato“, he enabled visitors to symbolically tap his chisels and thus reproduced his own interpretation of the artwork without ever having seen or touched it.