Those who hail from olive oil-producing regions usually maintain that theirs is the best. But there is only one definitive guide and it has decreed that the best region is Istria, a coastal landmass shared jointly by Croatia, Italy and Slovenia. Last week it was rated the world’s best olive-oil region for the fourth consecutive year by the 2019 edition of Flos Olei. The guide includes a record 79 Istrian olive growers, with oils from Istrian producers Chiavalon and Eno Zubin placing highest, and Oleum Maris from Vodnjan declared the best up-and-coming brand in the world. This should come as no surprise for a region whose symbol has been an olive since 50AD.

You’ve heard of guerrilla gardeners and cyclists but the newest addition to the urbanism-activist dictionary comes from Rome in the form of guerrilla restorers. City hall’s chronic underfunding of maintenance works around the Italian capital has meant that much of its infrastructure and cultural heritage is not being looked after as it should. Enter Gap (or Rapid-reaction Artisan Groups), anonymous collectives that have decided to skip the country’s infamously lengthy bureaucratic procedures and act in secret to fix its structures. Their first intervention consisted in the clean up and waterproofing of a fountain in the city’s south; another, fixing up a football pitch, is now in the works. Given Gap members are not professionals, they can’t replace municipal governments when it comes to larger projects – but theirs is a message that the mayor’s office needs to hear loud and clear.