Back in the late ‘80s, when I was still in elementary school, we used to study every region of Italy. Each week, we’d prepare a ricerca, a two- or three-page essay with photos and drawings, about the region we focused on: I used to love ricerche, so much so I ended up working as a researcher for a great part of my adult life.

Anyway… I remember that, when we had to study Sardinia, our maestra – who loved traveling and had visited what I would consider, as an 8-year-old, very exotic places like Egypt and even the United States – brought to class pieces of sughero, cork. We were all gobsmacked: of course, we were familiar with it, but not in that shape and form!