Studio Aalto

Case Study 3 - Studio Aalto

Case Study 3 - Studio Aalto

Case Study 3 - Studio Aalto

The studio building was designed in 1955, six years after Aino’s death. The office had grown and the space in the Aalto house was no longer large enough to accomodate the whole operation (Alvar Aalto Foundation, n.d.). The studio is located close to the Aalto house and the office there saw continued use by Alvar and Elissa as their private studio even after 1955 and construction of Studio Aalto (Jetsonen & Jetsonen, 2011, 60).

In 1963 the Taverna was built as an additional space for the staff to eat (Alvar Aalto Foundation, n.d.) where windows, similar to those on the entrance facade of the Villa Mairea can be found as seen in the photograph below.

The Taverna and top floor of the building are made up of fan shaped rooms which is another element found in other Aalto works such as in Villa Oksala or the Enso-Gutzeit Company Site engineers house (Jetsonen & Jetsonen, 2011, 180, 196). The facade towards the street is also closed and walled off while the view from Alvars own office towards the courtyard opens up with large windows along the curved wall. The other office staff on the other hand only got courtyard facing windows at the ceiling to let light in, perhaps to limit insight into Alvars office while he was working (Alvar Aalto Foundation, 2022). Organic shapes can also be found in the stairs in Alvars office and in the amphitheater/stairs in the garden.

Case Study 3 - Studio Aalto

The sketches above show in plan and elevation how the three fan shapes connect together and form the volumes of the studio building. What can also be seen to some degree is the fact that the rooms are not only fan shaped in plan but also in section as all three volumes also have slanted roofs. Looking back to the office in the Aalto house gives the impression that Alvar was quite content with the layout of the workspace save for the lack of space as the two offices are in fact quite similar to some degree.

The sketches to the left show the view of Alvars office, the top seen from the outside, looking from the large wall sometimes used to project movies or slideshows. The bottom sketch is a section looking outwards in the opposite direction also showing the balcony inside the office used to test lamps and other lighting fixtures