Alvar Aalto

Architect

1898-02-03 – 1976-05-11

Alvar Aalto was a Finnish architect and designer whose work is central to twentieth-century modernism. He combined functional design with organic forms across architecture, furniture, and glassware. He died in 1976.

Books by Alvar Aalto

Alvar Aalto
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The architectural drawings of Alvar Aalto, 1917-1939
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Quotes by Alvar Aalto

Just as it takes time for a speck of fish spawn to develop into a fully grown fish, so, too, we need time for everything that develops and crystallizes in the world of ideas. Architecture demands more of this time than other creative work.
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Nothing is as dangerous in architecture as dealing with separated problems. If we split life into separated problems we split the possibilities to make good building art.
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Once I tried to make a standardization of staircases. Probably that is one of the oldest of the standardizations. Of course, we design new staircase steps every day in connection with all our houses, but a standardized step depends on the height of the buildings and on all kinds of things.
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We should work for simple, good, undecorated things, but things which are in harmony with the human being and organically suited to the little man in the street.
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Building art is a synthesis of life in materialised form. We should try to bring in under the same hat not a splintered way of thinking, but all in harmony together.
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The tubular steel chair is surely rational from technical and constructive points of view. It is light, suitable for mass production, and so on. But steel and chromium surfaces are not satisfactory from the human point of view.
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Architecture is not merely national but clearly has local ties in that it is rooted in the earth.
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Human life is a combination of tragedy and comedy. The shapes and designs that surround us are the music accompanying this tragedy and this comedy.
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The ultimate goal of the architect...is to create a paradise. Every house, every product of architecture... should be a fruit of our endeavour to build an earthly paradise for people.
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The very essence of architecture consists of a variety and development reminiscent of natural organic life. This is the only true style in architecture.
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It is the task of the architect to give life a gentler structure.
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