Teija Isohauta worked as a curator of education at the Alvar Aalto Museum between 1986 and 2009. As freelancer she has worked on exhibitions at Alvar Aalto Museum and the Finnish Architecture Museum. She received a scholarship from the Finnish Culture Foundation to investigate deeper connections between Aalto and landscape, and has an MA from Jyväskylä University, Finland.

Contents

Preface by Jussi Rautsi

Introduction

WRITINGS OF ALVAR AALTO

Landscape

Biology and nature

Garden and architecture

THE ORIGIN OF AALTO'S LANDSCAPE CONCEPT

The Finnish national landscape

Light and shadow in Alvar Aalto's architecture

The garden art as part of landscape

The holistic approach in Aalto's architecture

Riihitie House

The garden city movement

Sunila

The re-evaluated landscape

The shifting contours in Aalto's architecture

Muurame Church

The room in between

Muuratsalo experimental house

Towards a modern landscape

Paimio Sanatorium

The forerunners of Nordic landscape architecture, the contemporaries of Aalto

Garden designers consulting Aalto

Ateljee Aalto

The Japanese reconstructed landscape

Authenticity of materials and forms in Aalto's architecture

Villa Mairea

The Mediterranean landscape

The constructed landscape of Aalto

Jyväskylä university

A side track to the Orient

National pensions Institute

The United States - genius loci and the raised importance of spatial planning

Aerial plans and greeneries

Oulu river rapids centre

ALVAR AALTO - THE INFLUNCES OF THE VISUAL ARTS

The Modern art in Aalto's time

Gesamtkunstwerk

The role of sketching

Salpausselkä relief and Suommussalmi war memorial

Shaping the terrain as an attribute in Aalto's architecture

Säynätsalo Town Hall

Toward 'monumental art'

Seinäjoki

CASE STUDIES

Green flexibility - Master plans of Imatra and Lapland

Two sides of Urbanism - Helsinki City Centre and satellite centre Stensvik

Two town halls using the best out of landscape - Kiruna and Alajärvi

Cultural projects - in a valley and on top - Nordic House and Shiraz Art museum

Churches as landmarks - Riola di Vergato and in Lahti

The private houses on the slope - Maison Carré and Villa Kokkonen

CONCLUSIONS Featuring landscape

ALVAR AALTO Architecture in the Landscape of Central Finland, 1926

CHRONOLOGY Aalto's main projects related to his writings, travels and personal contacts

Index