Alvar Aalto's unpretentious houses hold many lessons in our perilous economic times.

Alvar Aalto's unpretentious houses hold many lessons in our perilous economic times.

Slate
Architecture
What we build.
April 27 2011 11:12 AM

A Low-Key High Modernist

The unpretentious houses of Alvar Aalto.

Slide Show: The Unpretentious Houses of Alvar Aalto

Click here to read a slide show about Alvar Aalto's architecture.

Witold Rybczynski is Slate's architecture critic His latest book is The Biography of a Building: How Robert Sainsbury and Norman Foster Built a Great Museum. Visit his Web site. Follow him on Twitter.

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