Alvar Aalto: technology and nature

Episode of Series “Phaidon art collection”.
Born in Finland, Alvar Aalto (1898-1976) was one of the greatest architect and industrial designers of the 20th century. As a young man he rejected the ideals of art nouveau movement, preferring instead to follow his interests in functionalism. As a humanitarian he felt that democracy would be achieved by the mechanisation and standardisation of building practices, being the only way to give more to man. He also recognised the paradox of this and was to forever learn from nature, believing it to be the symbol of freedom. His architecture was widely accepted due to his success in marrying nature with art, man and mass production. But for Aalto, it was nature that was the great teacher, and nature that would provide the greatest inspiration to his work. Forever being influenced by the forests and nature broadly, his buildings would echo the elegance and asymmetry that expresses a natural order. Aalto’s humanitarian interests meant that the function of the building was always directed by the needs of the users. This earned Aalto lasting respect for his designs (i.e the Paimio Sanatorium has long been praised as one of the greatest buildings of the 20th Century), providing many humanitarian solutions to architectural problems. Aalto rejected synthetic materials and plastics, calling them, “drugstore architecture”, and preferred to use natural materials such as; wood, brick, stone, glass and ceramic tile. Aalto invested his interest in these materials and design to develop furniture and fittings to complete the interiors of his buildings. Aalto was most known in his industrial design for laminating and bending layers of birchwood to create bent wood furniture, a technique that has come to symbolise his home region.