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Avesta | Nynäshamn | Kansaneläkelaitos

Avesta

The town centre plan for Avesta in Sweden, which was designed in 1944 but never implemented, is the first crystallisation of Aalto’s town-centre thinking. In it, public buildings intended for different uses make up a free-form complex. This group of buildings surrounds a civic square, which is more or less open, and which forms a contrasting axis in relation to the rest of the urban fabric. Aalto was fond of changes of level in the terrain and he used this idea to create a hierarchy for the group of buildings. Where this did not exist, Aalto used artificial devices to raise buildings up to a higher level.