Reflections on Alvar Aalto and the Human Measure

Dear reader,

Just before leaving for the Christmas holiday, I watched a documentary about Alvar Aalto. It lingered with me longer than expected, settling somewhere between thought and feeling. As the days slowed and the light dimmed, I began to notice how much his way of thinking echoed my own work.

I work as a UX designer, a profession that, at first glance, seems far removed from architecture. And yet, the more I watched, the clearer the parallels became. Both are practices rooted in people — in how they move through a space, how they feel held or hurried, seen or overlooked. At their best, both architecture and design are acts of care.

So, here follows my scrambled thoughts. A slightly different letter to my usual style for you to enjoy at the beginning of this new year.

Subjectivity in our craft
There is a moment in the documentary where Alvar Aalto speaks quite plainly about subjectivity, about how it inevitably seeps into architecture, no matter how precise or rational the discipline might try to be. He acknowledges that his own perspective is always present, shaping decisions in ways that can’t be neatly explained. I find this honesty quietly disarming. In creative fields, there is often a desire to appear objective, to hide behind systems and principles. Aalto, instead, admits that architecture is personal simply because the architect is human.

On the people who shape us
The documentary opens by presenting him almost as a myth: the charismatic, successful male genius, effortlessly talented and admired. But as the narrative unfolds, that image softens. Beneath it is someone deeply aware of the social fabric that carried him forward; the conversations, friendships, and chance encounters that made his work possible. It makes me wonder who we are without the people who help shape us, without the quiet encouragements and open doors we rarely notice until we look back.

Empathy in the process of creating
Again and again, Aalto returns to the human being as his point of departure. The body, the senses, the lived experience. These are his true measurements. Nowhere is this more evident than in the Paimo Sanatorium, which was built after he experienced being a patient himself. There is something profoundly humble in that gesture. A reminder that understanding is not theoretical, but embodied and that empathy often begins by slowing down enough to feel what another person feels.

The joy in experiencing
One of the most tender scenes shows children running their hands along the railing in the Viipuri Library, tracing its curves with curiosity and delight. Watching them, I felt a quiet ache, the desire to create something that doesn’t just function, but invites touch, wonder, and play. Something that meets the world not with rigidity, but with openness.

A note on productivity
Aalto’s daughter recalls how it felt as though her father always had time. This, despite his remarkable productivity. It challenges our modern obsession with speed and efficiency. Perhaps it is precisely the absence of hurry, the permission to work slowly and attentively, that allows both depth and abundance to coexist. A gentler rhythm, where quality is not sacrificed for quantity, but somehow grows alongside it.

What I think is the difference between art and design
The documentary suggests that what is truly modern about Aalto’s work is not the buildings themselves, but the way they are used. This lingers with me. Meaning, after all, does not belong solely to the creator. It is shaped and reshaped by those who inhabit the space. In this way, design differs from art: it can fail—not aesthetically, but experientially—if it does not meet the needs of the people it was made for.

Collaboration
Aalto believed deeply in collaboration, in the idea that architecture is never the work of one hand alone. Authorship mattered less than the collective process, less than the shared effort of building something meaningful together. Aalto trusted his collaborators deeply, while also insisting on education and expertise. This balance, freedom within structure, feels both generous and fraught. It raises questions about who gets to participate, and how knowledge is defined and protected.

Context matters in our creation
He believed in creating forms flexible enough to evolve alongside the communities they serve. His idea of “flexible standardisation” suggests a world where structure exists not to constrain, but to support. This is necessary because context matters. The ground beneath a building, literal and metaphorical, was always taken seriously.

In the end, Aalto’s work seems to begin not with answers, but with possibilities. With accessibility. With an invitation to inhabit space thoughtfully and fully. And perhaps that is what human-centred architecture truly is: not a style or a movement, but a way of paying attention to bodies, to time, to one another.

You can watch the documentary here: Aalto Architect of Emotions (2020)