On my way I passed a colleague who was carrying the below sketch by Sir Hugh Casson PRA. It was delicately wrapped in tissue paper on the way to be framed for the Casson exhibition which was to shortly open. It was a serendipitous moment. Siza had proposed working with columns in the courtyard, and Souto de Moura with door arches in the Main Galleries.

On looking at the sketch, I saw that there was indeed a place within the Royal Academy – between courtyard and galleries where the columns themselves met the door arches. Every time I now walk up the main staircase from the entrance hall I appreciate this junction. How else might these architects make us look more carefully at the spaces around us?