ABSTRACT
T
he doctoral dissertation of Marianna Heikinheimo, Master of Science in
Architecture, Master of Fine Arts, in the field of architectural history Architec-
ture and Technology: Alvar Aalto’s Paimio Sanatorium discusses the relationship
between architecture and technology in Paimio Sanatorium (1928–1933), designed by
the renowned Finnish master architect, Alvar Aalto. The building is considered the
turning point in Aalto’s career and one of the most significant works of international
Modernism in the inter-war period. In the face of increasingly rapid industrialisation
and urbanisation, European architecture was at the time undergoing a dramatic ideo-
logical shift. Aalto came into contact with avant-garde architects through the organi-
sation Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne (CIAM) from 1929 onwards.
Aalto’s aim with the design for Paimio Sanatorium, the most challenging assignment of
his career so far, was to apply the new approach to architecture.
The theoretical underpinning for the study is the actor-network theory developed
by the French sociologist Bruno Latour (1947). Besides the social theory, it also assigns
a role for material factors in the evolution of technological systems. In this theory, the
relationship between social and material actants is reciprocal, an observation which opens
up interesting angles into architectural research. For the purpose of this dissertation, I
understand symbolic expression in architecture as a system with its own logic and, in
contrast, construction as a technological system forming the framework within which the
practical problems of building are resolved. According to the British architect and scholar
Alan Colquhoun, symbolic representation and empirical building are parallel systems.
Symbolic representation is based on facts while architecture is bound to a given social,
technological or economic situation in time.^2 A building with all its qualities and features
has, in the present study, been understood as a technological system formed by people,
organisations and material actors. The case study deals with the interaction between the
architect and the other stakeholders within the scope of one building project. Aalto won
the open architectural competition in 1929 and was able to influence the overall design
solutions of the building from the very beginning of the project.
This study investigates how Aalto managed to reconcile international ideology and
local building culture in a country where the degree of industrialisation in the building
sector was relatively low. Specific attention has been given to the solutions that were
new at the time, such as the heating, ventilation, sewage and electrical systems: who
knew how to implement them and what were the critical points to consider in devel-
oping the solutions; were the systems sufficiently ready to be used as such, or did the
architect or other project stakeholders contribute to their development; is it plausible
to understand them as being part of Aalto’s tectonic approach in a way similar to the
well-known concrete frame of the sanatorium?
2 Colquhoun 1962, p. 508.