Alvar Aalto

Overview work showed in this site

Alvar Aalto
FINLAND

Architecture should always be a medium that concerns itself with the organic link between building and nature (i.e. a medium which places greater value on the human being and on human life than on any other consideration.)

ALVAR AALTO
1898-1976

The concern for the physical and psychological wellbeing of the human being forms the red thread which runs through the extensive work of Alvar Aalto. On account of a competition he won in 1929 for a sanatorium in Paimio he made a name for himself as a functional architect.

In the thirties and forties the use of fired bricks and wood became more widely used in place of concrete. He experimented with laminated timber and  produced numerous innovative designs for furniture.

Parallel to this the dialogue between the building and its natural environment became an increasingly important theme in Aalto’s work. This is expressed both in the spatial layout of the building mass as well as in the movement of its forms.

In this respect during the course of his life Aalto developed an ever increasing freedom and richness in his language of form. His later designs are characterized by a strong, if understated vitality, which, feeling like an echo from the surrounding nature, has a refreshing effect on our inner life.

Click on a building for details

Church of the three crossesChurch of the three crosses Vuokkseniska, Imatra, Finnland, 1957-1959 
Finlandia hallFinlandia hall Helsinki, Finnland, 1962-1975