Alvar Aalto Summer Homes

There is something essentially Finnish about Alvar Aalto¿s summer villas, something modest and informal ¿ something that expresses the traditional Finnish way of spending one¿s free time with relatives and friends. Alvar Aalto Summer Homes presents small, intimate and personal summer houses and saunas designed by Aalto ¿ his early works as well as later ones that have been published only rarely. Also included are two summer homes that Aalto designed and had built for himself: Villa Flora (designed together with Aino Aalto), from Aalto¿s early production, and the world-famous Experimental House. The summer homes featured in the book were designed by Aalto for his relatives, close friends or clients for whom he had already designed larger commissions. Villa Vekara, the Korpikoto Hunting Lodge, Villa Kihlman, the Enso-Gutzeit Country Club and Sauna, Villa Eino Manner and Villa Oksala were all individually designed and took into account the wishes of the client. As Aalto wrote in his well-known article ¿From doorstep to living room¿ (1926): ¿But if you want my blessing for your home, it should have one further characteristic: you must give yourself away in some little detail...¿ Alvar Aalto Summer Homes is the third part in the Rakennustieto series of books devoted to Aalto¿s housing designs and it complements the picture of an architect who despite his international career preserved a genuine touch for Finnish nature and the Finnish way of life.