Visiting Piazza Falconieri makes you feel as if you were in a fairytale. The stone used for these beautiful buildings and decorations has a particularly interesting story.

Living in a studio apartment during the quarantine was especially challenging. Bergamo was one of the worst hit cities in Italy and the rate at which coffins piled up was shocking.

What's so special about Lecce? It has something to do with the kind of stone found there. And masters of art and architecture knew how to make beautiful buildings with it, giving rise to the Lecce Baroque.

The Columbus laboratory is the first permanent European research facility in space. There, astronauts carry out experiments and applications in space science, Earth observation and technology. Columbus offers European scientists full access to a weightless environment that cannot possibly be duplicated on Earth.

During the first wave of the pandemic, working in the hospital was especially grim. No visitors were allowed, so families had to stay close by phone and with a health-care worker helping out. It was hard for everyone.

In this episode, we travel to Lecce, to the very heel of the Italian "boot," at the southernmost tip of the Italian peninsula. Lecce is an iconic example of the Italian Baroque, which encompassed music, art, literature, and philosophy.

Some simple experiments with various materials help us understand what goes into planning the construction of a spacecraft. And then we wonder how we would go about making a planet inhabitable to humans.

Italians adopted English words to describe the new system of working from home. They've called it smart working. No one was happy about the virus, but some people could see the bright side. Others were very stressed out and would go on a disinfecting rampage. The worst situation was in hospitals, where health care workers were pretty much flying blind.

Don't forget the baking soda, but be careful. Basta pochissimo (a little goes a long way). The same goes for the lemon juice. As you will see, this recipe is very simple, so have fun!

3D printing is going to be a huge factor in conducting the safe exploration of the Moon and Mars. Experiments carried out on the "nearby" Moon will be crucial for later trips to Mars, a much more complicated, long-term enterprise.

Going to school remotely from home was hard for everyone, kids and young adults alike, not to mention for the teachers. And, just imagine trying to train to be a ballet dancer. People had to get creative and at the same time, deal with reality.

It's a shame to throw away perfectly good fruit, just because some of it is bruised. Andromeda shows us her anti-waste recipe for fruit preserves.

The International Space Station has the goal of developing and testing technologies for space exploration that are capable of keeping a crew alive on long-term missions in lunar and Martian orbits. To do this, preliminary work is being done on the Gateway platform: a space station beyond Earth's orbit.

There were a few places untouched by the pandemic, for example, near the North Pole. Some people had a hard time getting out of bed. Others became creative.

Bel canto (beautiful singing) and lyric opera began in Italy, and, not surprisingly, this country has the highest number of opera theaters in the world. Thus we conclude this episode of Meraviglie (wonders).