To Be Finnish or Not to Be: National Identity in Alvar Aalto’s Architecture

The famous Viipuri Library (1930–1935) is an example of the influence of Nordic Classicism in Aalto’s work: the early design of 1927 included a frieze with classical figures and a sunken center hall reminiscent of Asplund’s Stockholm Municipal Library (1922–1928), considered an example of Nordic Classicism where the classical order and ornament were reduced to the simplest geometrical forms. While the design was subsequently altered, the exterior of the Viipury Library, in its simplicity, remains characteristic of Nordic Classicism.

By the 1930s, however, Functionalism had replaced Nordic Classicism as the predominant architectural paradigm in Europe. Utility, function, materials, and technique were now the paramount principles, while form and appearance became subservient to function.

Aalto was part of a network of prominent international modernist architects including Le Corbusier and Gropius, with whom he exchanged ideas on this new orientation. These contacts had a strong influence on Aalto, whose style evolved accordingly. At that point, Aalto clearly felt more international than Finnish as evidenced by his correspondence with Gropius.

Once again, the Viipuri Library is a good example of Aalto’s new functionalist orientation: while the exterior of the library is reminiscent of Nordic Classicism, the materials used throughout the building (concrete, glass, and steel) are the hallmarks of Functionalism. The library boasted crisp lines and clear geometrical forms, and featured functional technological innovations in terms of lighting and acoustics in particular.

In this same period of the early 1930s, Aalto developed an interest in socialist housing and planning systems, and he became well acquainted with Soviet architecture and Constructivism. Many of his friends from the modernist circles were also closely following the developments of architecture and planning in the USSR, and some of them even moved to Moscow.

This circulation of ideas between Functionalist architects and Constructivism is not surprising. The two movements were born of the same idea to adapt to the modern industrialized world and urban society, and they shared common principles: the importance of function, materials and technology, aesthetic of the machine, and social purpose.

While this interest in Soviet architecture was short lived, some of Aalto’s works of the early 1930s bear the imprint of Constructivism. In the Paimio Sanatorium (1929–1933) for instance, the rotation of components to adapt them to the topography and the sun’s path are reminiscent of Russian Constructivist works of the 1920s and 1930s, such as the architectural fantasies of Yakov Chernikhov.

The Finnishness of Aalto’s style

While Aalto’s works have certainly benefitted from several foreign influences, it would be wrong to assume that Aalto’s personal style wasn’t also shaped by his Finnish origins. Aalto’s “Finnishness” was first and foremost linked to his closeness to nature, which permeated his works of the late 1930s. One of the main “natural” features observable in his works is the reference to the forests of Finland and the use of wood. Wood is Finland’s greatest natural resource and as such, it has become an emblem of the country.

Villa Mairea (1938–1939) is an example of the innovative way in which Aalto used wood: he brought the forest inside the house thanks to the wooden panels on the exterior, the beech ceiling, the vertical wooden poles irregularly framing the staircase, and the pine poles surrounding the porch.

Furthermore, the garden courtyard outside the house fuses with the surrounding forest at its limits without clear boundaries, thereby organically integrating the whole construction into the surrounding landscape. Aalto’s individual style and originality is in this reinterpretation of modernist design and form, infusing it with traditional Finnish materials and creating a type of regional modernism, thereby reconciling the modern industrialized world with nature.

Aalto also drew inspiration from other elements of Finnish nature and traditions. In the Villa Mairea, many elements are reminiscent of the Finnish vernacular architecture, including the open living room inspired by the “tupa” (the traditional shared living space of the Finnish farmhouse), the fireplace inspired by the traditional Finnish stove, or the sauna with the turf roof in the courtyard.

One of his signature forms, the curve, is also seen as being inspired by nature, namely the irregular contours of Finnish lakes or perhaps mountains. The undulating wooden ceiling in the auditorium of the Viipuri Library is an early example of this undulation feature of Aalto’s work.

However, many elements of Aalto’s design that have been attributed to his closeness to nature are not unique to the architect. For example, the rattan-wrapped columns in the Villa Mairea can be linked to Japanese design, the organic integration of the villa in its landscape is reminiscent of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater villa (1936–1939), while the undulation feature had already been used by Le Corbusier in the Swiss Pavilion of the Cité Universitaire in Paris in 1930–1932.

Aalto’s Finnishness: a Geopolitical Construction

One may wonder then why Aalto’s architecture came to be defined so much by his national identity. The response lays in the historical and geopolitical context of Aalto’s rise to prominence: in fact, Aalto’s Finnishness was a construction dictated by his circumstances. The period when Aalto turned toward a more organic architecture and became internationally famous (between the early 1930s and the end of World War II in 1945) was marked by important geopolitical events that had a strong impact on Europe and Finland: the rise of the extreme right in continental Europe; the Winter War of 1939–1940, and the Continuation War of 1941–1944, which resulted in Finland ceding substantial parts of its territory to the USSR; and World War II, followed by the Cold War, which confirmed the loss of Karelia and left Finland at the frontier between East and West. In this context, Aalto’s Finnishness was constructed as a reaction to these events.

Influential critics like Giedion contributed substantially to Aalto’s international success by emphasizing his national identity. For Giedion, Aalto became an alternative to both extreme nationalism and to homogenous internationalism. Aalto’s national identity was allegedly more “innocent” than that of countries like France and Germany because Finland was a young country located at the periphery of Europe and at the crossroads between East and West. This presumably allowed Aalto a freer approach to architecture, unburdened by past architectural paradigms and unrelated to the political instability of continental Europe, the corrupted totalitarian nationalism of Nazi Germany, and the new Marxist Internationalism of the USSR.

Aalto himself actively contributed to this construction of his Finnishness especially when the Finno-Russian war broke out. In 1939–1940, he went on a diplomatic mission to the United States to seek financial aid for the Finnish reconstruction effort. There, he gave lectures and wrote articles explaining that Finnish architects were not to be associated with the Marxist-Communist Internationalism. Instead, Aalto presented Finnish modern architecture as being politically and culturally “innocent” and with an independent development path.

The Finnish Pavilion designed by Aalto at the New York World’s Fair of 1939 illustrates this point. The exhibition was called Finland – the Country of Freedom and Democratic Spirit which in itself was already a claim that Finland was not to be associated with the Soviet Union or with the convulsed continental Europe struggling with Nazism. Instead, Finland was to be viewed as sharing the United States’ core values of freedom and democracy.

The pavilion itself presented Finland as a politically innocent country. To achieve that, rather than explicitly displaying national architecture and design as was common in previous world exhibitions, Aalto focused on creating a “Finnish” atmosphere based on Finland’s landscapes and nature. He used wood, undulating lines and various medias to subtly convey this image of a young, naïve, and primitive country, that existed before the birth of nation-states.

The myth of Aalto’s Finnishness and more generally of Finland’s place in the world was further reinforced after the end of World War II and during the Cold War, in an attempt to definitely establish Finland as part of the West, rather than the USSR. In this context, some of Aalto’s works acquired the status of national symbols, connecting Aalto’s name with Finland even more.

The destiny of the Viipuri Library is quite telling: the building was completed in 1935 in the Finnish city of Viipuri but, in 1944, Finland had to cede Viipuri to the Soviet Union as a consequence of the Continuation War. This loss was of significant importance for Finland because the ceded area was at the heart of the Karelian region where most of the Finnish national folk tales (which are making up the Kalevala epic) were collected. Viipuri and Aalto’s library therefore became the symbol of this “lost Karelia,” an important component of the “Finnish soul,” although the building itself was constructed in the International Style and, at the time, raised concerns for being too modernist and unsuitable to the more traditional surroundings of the Torkkeli Park.

So, while Aalto’s works, especially in the early years, bear the imprint of foreign influences, he developed a more personal style later on, combining modernity and references to Finnish nature and traditions in a more organic and irrational architecture. But this romanticized vision of Aalto’s Finnishness was largely dictated by the historical and geopolitical context. Nevertheless, although this Finnishness may have been a construction to a certain extent, one cannot deny that Aalto managed to create a recognizable personal style that escapes any single label. Perhaps then, his Finnishness was in the particular combination of several different perspectives (local, Nordic, European, personal) made possible by Finland’s history and geographical position in the world.