Résumé

This new biography of Aalto is the first to comprehensively cover his life, from the backwoods of Ostrabothnia to international fame and all of his buildings, from the early alterations and extensions to shops and houses in Jyvaskyla to Finlandia Hall.It draws on Aalto's archive, recollections of former employees and contemporaneous publications to fully explore Alvar Aalto the architect, rather than simply Alvar Aalto's architecture. For the first time, his life is set in the context of the events that surrounded and shaped it - the Finnish Civil War, the Great Depression, The Winter and Continuation Wars, the post-war boom in education, Finland's industrialisation and eventually the social revolution of the 60s which led to his characterization as a member of a Finnish elite and temporary unpopularity. It deals with his personal life, his marriage to Aino, what working life in his first office was like, the architectural competitions, his key friendships and continuous financial difficulties.This book is about an architect and his architecture, written by another architect, not an architectural historian. It is the first, frank and fully-comprehensive biography of Alvar Aalto. (source : éditeur)