My project uses the Sanpietrini, the basalt cobblestones that cover Rome’s historic core, as a lens through which to explore the relationship between material, craft and labor in the making and ongoing adaptation of Rome’s streets and plazas. It is said, perhaps apocryphally, that the Sanpietrini themselves were cut from the stone of ancient Roman roads, a symbol of the ways in which the city has often adapted its past. In my own work, as a landscape architect designing urban spaces, the past is a continuous presence: its imprint and previous uses shaping the present possibilities of site. This project aims to both examine Rome’s past and use that work to inform speculations that look towards the future. Archival research will inform drawings and documentary photography that explore the material sources, craft techniques and labor that sustain the Sanpietrini. Experiments with hands-on fabrication methods and alternative photographic print processes aim to open future speculative possibilities for the material and experiential qualities of pavers and urban surfaces. Together, these explorations at the American Academy will inspire my ongoing practices, as landscape architect and photographer, situating them within an embodied understanding of the art of city making.