Includes bibliographical references (p. [314]-315) and index

Of the indisputably great figures in 20th-century architecture, Alvar Aalto (1898-1976)is in many ways the most humane, the least rigid, the most relevant to our contemporary sensibility and the emerging future. This sumptuous book offers a thorough study of an innovative and prolific master, whom Frank Lloyd Wright termed a genius.

Published to accompany a retrospective exhibition that opens at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, on February 19, 1998, this fresh, penetrating examination of Aalto's work and influence includes essays by five notable critics and historians. Some 50 of Aalto's projects -- houses, town halls, cultural institutions, factories, furniture and glass designs, and regional plans -- from all periods of his extraordinarily productive career are illustrated and described, using much previously unpublished and newly photographed material.