This captivating exploration of Alvar Aalto, the defining figure in Scandic design and one of Europe’s greatest modern architects, focuses on his remarkable and loving partnership with wife, Aino.

Theirs was a profoundly humanist vision that put people at the centre of design, and ranged from work in furniture design through to huge architectural projects.

They mixed with, and influenced, major figures of modernist art and design including Le Corbusier, Gropius, Moholy-Nagy, and Frank Lloyd Wright.

Come on a cinematic tour of their iconic buildings all over the world, from a library in Russia, a student dormitory at MIT, an art collector’s private house near Paris, to a pavilion in Venice.

Narrated by experts in the field and featuring never before seen archive footage, Aalto tells the love story of an extraordinary couple with a great passion for human scale architecture.

Director: Virpi Suutari
Year: 2020
Country: Finland
Duration: 103mins

Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival – Official Selection

Adelaide International Film Festival – Official Selection

London Architecture Film Festival – Official Selection

Locarno Film Festival – Official Selection

New York Architecture & Design Film Festival – Official Selection

This specially curated and finely calibrated program explores culture, the built environment and the way people operate in it.

 Built for the big screen, it explores the world of the individuals and societies that have created those environments and the forces that shape them. From renowned architects and designers to the power of economics and global politics, this series of international films dives deeply into the struggle between people and their environment, global forces that shape the way we live and the ongoing dilemma between the built and the natural. 

With all but one title being Western Australian premieres, this series curated by Revelation Film Festival Director, Richard Sowada, includes stunning cinematic explorations of form, urgent social justice, meditative cultural observations and brilliantly told portraits.

These excellent works take audiences on a journey not just through architecture and design but ideas and advocacy that place us at the centre of contemporary thinking.

Behind each form and each element within each form, sits ideas and inspirations that synthesise great social, technological and political change.

At their core, lives inspiration and ambition that embrace maverick and outsider approaches that collide head-on with establishment, deliberately or otherwise.

FDW Film Festival presented by: