The Aalto Vase, also known as the Savoy Vase, is a piece of glassware created by Alvar Aalto and his wife Aino that has become an internationally known iconic piece of Finnish design.[1][2] It became known as the Savoy Vase because it was one of a range of custom furnishings and fixtures created by Alvar and Aino Aalto for the luxury Savoy restaurant in Helsinki that opened in 1937.
The vase was also designed as an entry in a design competition for the Ahlström-owned Karhula-Iittala glassworks factory in 1936. The design was inspired by the dress of a Sami woman. Called Eskimåkvinnans skinnbyxa (the Eskimo woman's leather breech),[3] the design consisted of a series of crayon drawings on cardboard and scratch paper. Aalto created initial prototypes by blowing glass in the middle of a composition of wooden sticks stuck into the ground, letting the molten glass swell on only some sides and creating a wavy outline. The initial manufacture of the vase was not without problems and the original idea of using molds made of thin steel sheets forced together to form closed sinuous shapes had to be abandoned. The vase was originally manufactured by the glassworks factory using a wood mold which was slowly burned away.
This vase was later displayed for the 1937 World's Fair in Paris[3] and the original height of the Savoy vase was 140 millimetres (5.5 in).
Aalto never made money with the vase, because the design belonged to the factory for which the design competition entry was produced.
The vase has been manufactured in nearly a full spectrum of colours. The simplicity of the vase continues to be popular in the 21st century. Smaller versions of the vase, just as Aalto designed them with the seams visible and a slight curve at the base, are still produced by glasspressing at the Iittala glass factory in Iittala, Finland. Larger versions are made using Aalto's design, but without seams.
In recent times the vase has achieved iconic status, inspiring adaptations and appropriations by contemporary designers including Jan Ctvrtnik,[4] Maxim Velčovský [cs][5] and Tobi Wong.[6]
^Mara Vorhees (2 November 2012). "An Alvar Aalto tour of Finland". BBC Travel, Lonely Planet. Retrieved 22 December 2013. His curvaceous Savoy vase is still an icon of Finnish design 75 years after its creation. But these internationally known pieces are not the basis for Aalto's title as the father of Modernism.
^Hauffe, Thomas (1996). Design. Oslo: Cappelen. p. 126. ISBN 9788202159863. "Vasen vant internasjonal berømmelse etter krigen, ..." (The vase won international fame after the war ..)
^ ab"Eskimonaisen nahkahousut eli Savoy-maljakko täyttää 70 vuotta". formin.finland.fi (in Finnish). Archived from the original on 8 July 2012. Retrieved 19 December 2011.
^"Alvar Aalto's Savoy Vase Continues to Inspire Designers". Finnish Design Blog. Archived from the original on 22 January 2012. Retrieved 19 December 2011.
^"Ceramics". Icon. April 2005. Archived from the original on 13 January 2012. Retrieved 19 December 2011.
^"The Identity & Para Identity of Tobi Wong". Guy Keulemans: design research and objects. Retrieved 19 December 2011.
The AaltoVase, also known as the Savoy Vase, is a piece of glassware created by Alvar Aalto and his wife Aino that has become an internationally known...
Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto (pronounced [ˈhuːɡo ˈɑlʋɑr ˈhenrik ˈɑːlto]; 3 February 1898 – 11 May 1976) was a Finnish architect and designer. His work includes...
seen in the early designs of Aino Aalto glasses designed by Aino Aalto in 1932; Alvar Aalto’s Savoy Vase (AaltoVase) from 1936; Oiva Toikka’s Birds by...
University, Finnish university, named after Alvar AaltoAaltoVase, glassware designed by Aino and Alvar Aalto Hanks, Patrick, ed. (2003). Dictionary of American...
Owings & Merrill. The building’s curved glass design is based on Alvar Aalto’sAaltoVase of Finnish design created in 1936. The interiors are designed by AD100...
arrested after Sachs allowed visitors to take live ammunition from an Alvar Aaltovase. Around the same time, Sachs' SONY Outsider (1998) opened at SITE Santa...
in 1871, now forms part of Aalto University. Prominent Finnish designers include Alvar Aalto (vases, furniture), Aino Aalto (glassware), Kaj Franck (glass...
collaborated with her husband on the design of the celebrated Savoy Vase in 1936. Aalto worked in the Artek office until 1949, when she died of cancer. Aino...
Petersburg. In the 1930s, the factory produced Alvar Aalto's designer glassware including Aaltovases. After the sale of beer became freer in the 1960s,...
wave-like form was already established as a leitmotiv of Aalto's work: it was familiar from the vases designed for the 'Savoy Restaurant' in Helsinki. It also...
School of Industrial Design (Taideteollisuuskeskuskoulu), now part of the Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture, graduating in 1943....
production, Finlandia for a "bark glass" vase series and Suomi ("Finland") for a tableware design. He designed glass vases and silver dinnerware for the presidential...
School of Industrial Arts (Taideteollisuuskeskuskoulu, now part of the Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture), graduating in 1943...
Mallet-Stevens, and the pavilion of Finland, with wood-covered walls, by Alvar Aalto. Le Corbusier had a small pavilion of his own, made of canvas, at the edge...
Cambridge, Massachusetts, US. Aalto is also famous for his work in furniture (e.g. the Paimio chair [fi]) and glassware (e.g. Savoy vase). Much of the folk music...
success as a glass designer began in 1946 when he designed the Kantarelli vase for Iittala, and the mass-produced Tapio collection was launched in 1954...
"Google pro české Street View nafotil 50 měst a mraky památek – ITBIZ – Vaše jednička mezi nulami". Itbiz.cz. June 20, 2012. Retrieved July 9, 2012. "Google...
represent Belgian Art Deco silverware. The modernism of Le Corbusier, Alvar Aalto, Marcel Breuer, Mies van der Rhoe and Lilly Reich (Knoll collection), Christa...
Alvar Aalto, renowned as an architect, also designed a significant number of household items, such as chairs, stools, lamps, a tea-cart, and vases. Raymond...
Corinthian and Roman pottery, Persian miniatures, Islamic and Chinese vases and dishes, etc. It also includes pieces from modern artists such as the...
was 39 at the time, and very taken with the Nordic activities of Alvar Aalto and Gunnar Asplund. The figure who really drove the project forward was...
Casey. 20th-century design in the collection includes furniture by Alvar Aalto, Verner Panton, Josef Hofmann, and Charles and Ray Eames; metalwork by Erik...
with the Bronze Age cultures of Cyprus, Crete and Mycenae it also includes vases that come from Corinth and Athens, the islands in the Aegean, East Greece...
Global Information