FINNISH ARCHITECTURE AND ALVAR AALTO
Ed. and Cl. Neuenschwander
Ed[uard] and Cl[audia] Neuenschwander: FINNISH ARCHITECTURE AND ALVAR AALTO. New York: Praeger, 1954. First English-language edition [parallel texts in German, French and English]. Octavo. Cream cloth decorated and titled in gilt. Photo illustrated dust jacket. 192 pp. 300 black and white photographs, plans and detailed layouts. Lower corners gently pushed, otherwise a fine copy in a fine dust jacket. Scarce.
7.25 x 10.75 hardcover book with 192 pages and 300 black and white photographs, plans and detailed layouts. Titled on spine: Atelier Alvar Aalto 1950/1951, and originally published by Verlag für Architektur Erlenbach, Zürich (1954).
Aalto said "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." His visionary glassware, furniture, and architecture whether residential, corporate, or cultural remain humane. Not something to be said about all great modernist architects.
Finnish architect Alvar Aalto (1898 – 1976) was not only influenced by the landscape of his native country, but by the political struggle over Finland's place within European culture. After early neoclassical buildings, Alvar Aalto turned to ideas based on Functionalism, subsequently moving toward more organic structures, with brick and wood replacing plaster and steel. In addition to designing buildings, furniture, lamps, and glass objects with his wife Aino, he painted and was an avid traveler. A firm believer that buildings have a crucial role in shaping society, Aalto once said, “The duty of the architect is to give life a more sensitive structure.”
”Modern architecture does not mean using immature new materials; the main thing is to work with materials towards a more human line.” - Alvar Aalto