Chapter 2 | Alvar Aalto's Professional Networksstereotype room,^359 offices, the editorial offices and retail, office and residential spaces
for let. Aalto wrote about the “dualism” of the building, referring to the division between
the spaces occupied by the newspaper and the spaces that were let to outsiders. He drew
particular attention to the seven-metre-tall window, onto which the image of a newspaper
was projected, a façade within façade. He also introduced the structural system of the
reinforced concrete building that had a flat roof with a roof garden, mentioning especially
the ventilation, advertising technology, wiring routes and iron windows. Emil Henriksson
carried out the structural calculations and Harald Wildhagen from Aalto’s office was in
charge of the drawings and supervision. Other contributors to the project were Aino
Marsio-Aalto and Erling Bjertnæs.^360
Schildt had the opportunity to interview Harald Wildhagen and Erling Bjertnæs,
the Norwegian architects who worked at Aalto’s office during the Turku period. Accord-
ing to Schildt, the collaboration between the architect and engineer was governed by
the Staplemohrian model: the engineer set the boundary conditions within which
the artist-architects would realise their instincts. In Schildt’s view, the columns of the
printing hall of the Turun Sanomat Newspaper Building were the result of collabora-
tion between Emil Henriksson, Harald Wildhagen and Alvar Aalto.^361 Here, Schildt
followed the general approach in art-historical research to the tectonics in architecture:
structures were not considered from the perspective of execution or, for example, the
difficulty of the novel realisation process, but from that of ideas and formal motifs.
During his Turku years, Aalto also formed a collaborative network with local profes-
sionals and companies who shared his approach and who contributed to his projects to
varying degrees. It was likely that Aalto was introduced to Turku-based builder circles
by Erik Bryggman, as some of them, such as master builder Arvi Ahti^362 and engineer
Emil Henriksson, who had previously worked with Bryggman, would later participate
in projects with Aalto as the architect. Architect colleague Ilmari Sutinen from Turku,
contributed to the creation of CIAM exhibition sheets with Aalto. Aalto’s collaborative
network during his Turku period included other notable businessmen and companies,
such as the furniture manufacturer Otto Korhonen and his company Huonekalu- ja
Rakennustyötehdas (Furniture and Building Work Factory), the Turku shipyard
Crichton- Vulcan,^363 factory owner and contractor Juho Tapani and lighting designer
Paavo Tynell and his manufacturing company, Taito Oy.^364
359 The stereotype room was a space were printed matter using metal or wooden printing plates was produced. For
example, some of the special typefaces and symbols were printed with plates. Personal conversation with Päivi
Hovi-Wasastjerna on December 23, 2011.
360 Aalto 1930c, pp. 82–90.
361 Schildt was referring to an article on the expressive potential of concrete architecture, published in 1927 in Bygg
mästaren. Schildt 1985, pp. 45–46; Stapelmohr, O. von. 1927, pp. 75–80.
362 Arvi Ahti (Fagerroos) was born in 1888. He trained as a master builder at Turku Industrial School graduating in 1911 and
made study trips to Sweden, Denmark, Germany, France and the Netherlands. Ahti worked as a building contractor from
1916 onwards. He was a member of the committee in the Finnish Association of Master Builders between 1928 and 1933,
the member of the board of its Turku division and its chairman from 1923 onwards. Talvitie 1936, p. 28.
363 Suominen-Kokkonen 2007, pp. 51–52.
364 The first mention of Taito Oy in Aalto’s materials appears in the project description of the Southwest Finland Ag-
ricultural Cooperative Building. See Aalto 1929a, p. 85. Poutasuo has argued that the collaboration between the
two began only with Paimio Sanatorium. Poutasuo 2005, pp. 28–30.