This paper aims to review Dante Bini’s career, as well as his form-resistant Binishell and other pneumatic construction systems. The role of Mario Salvadori in Bini’s international success works as the introduction to a broader discussion about the relationship between innovation in design and innovation in construction for shell and gridshell designers. The second part of the paper focuses, instead, on Bini’s double profile—architect and builder—which led him to develop his inventions both architecturally and as commercial products.

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Exhibition and catalogue review, Architecture Australia (summary on hardcopy, full review online).

The cultural legacy of Pier Luigi Nervi, one of Italy’s most influential modern architect-engineers, was the subject of the Pier Luigi Nervi and Australia: Outback Modernism Exhibition (6–16 June 2017). Held at the Harry Seidler-designed QV1 Building in Perth, the exhibition demonstrated the breadth and complexity of Nervi’s international projects, his collaborative work with Seidler and his contribution to the wider Australian vernacular. Annette Condello, senior lecturer in architecture at Curtin University, curated and organized the exhibition in collaboration with Cristiana Chiorino from ComunicArch Associates, Turin, and the Pier Luigi Nervi Project Association, Brussels – a foundation committed to the preservation of Nervi’s legacy and the rehabilitation of his structures. A selection of Nervi’s projects were exhibited, including the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, the Cathedral of St Mary of the Assumption in San Francisco and the New Norcia Cathedral and Monastery in rural Western Australia.

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This paper presents the construction of Airshell, a small timber gridshell prototype erected by employing a pneumatic formwork. Inspired by the work of Frei Otto and Dante Bini, the technique is based on a pneumatic membrane and an Arduino® board – the former used as dynamic formwork and the latter to monitor both the structure height and the membrane pressure throughout the process. The prototype was erected in Pesaro, Italy, in December 2016; the design replicates a gridshell built in Lecce in 2009 by the Italian company "Gridshell.it", which was built through a more conventional push-up technique. A comparison between the two erection methods is therefore proposed in terms of construction speed and accuracy/precision of the built form. Design and technological aspects, as well as time frame and budget of the proposed construction technique are detailed within the text. The paper also discusses the relationship between the digital simulation of the erection process, which was already formulated by Liuti et al. in 2015, and the actual results achieved.