Detail View: Archivision Base to Module 13: Baker House Dormitory
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Collection:
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Archivision Base to Module 13
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Preferred Title:
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Baker House Dormitory
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Alternate Title:
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Baker House
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Image View:
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Interior, lounge (dining hall) wing, upper level, overlooking Charles River
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Creator:
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Alvar Aalto (Finnish architect, 1898-1976)
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Location:
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site: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States)
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Location Note:
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362 Memorial Drive
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GPS:
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+42.356712-71.095675
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Date:
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1947-1949 (creation)
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Cultural Context:
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American
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Style Period:
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Modernist; Twentieth century
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Work Type 1:
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dormitory (building)
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Classification:
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architecture
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Material:
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brick; concrete; limestone
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Technique:
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construction (assembling)
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Description:
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In 1946 Aalto resumed his teaching at MIT but confined his stays there to three or four months in a year. His most important contribution there was the building of Baker House Dormitory (1947-1949). This building of red tiles, with its huge serpentine façade facing the river and steps rising in cascade form on the inner frontage, is the realization of Aalto's dream of flexible standardization, based on nature's principle of individualization: all 260 of the students' rooms with a view over the Charles River have different shapes (some wedge-shaped) and therefore varied interior fixtures and (built-in) furniture (also designed by Aalto). (The dormitory houses 318 undergraduates in single, double, triple and quadruple rooms.) It has been renovated, most recently by Perry Dean Rogers Architects, modernizing the plumbing, telecommunications, and electrical systems and removing some of the interior changes made over the years that were not in Aalto's original design. The building is now wheelchair accessible. (Source: Grove Art Online; http://www.groveart.com/)
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Image Description:
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Structural columns are covered in plaster on the lower floor and as they rise up towards the second level, timber cladding allows them to form a relationship with the trees.
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Collection:
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Archivision Addition Module Eight
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Identifier:
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1A1-AA-BH-E16
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Rights:
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© Scott Gilchrist, Archivision, Inc.
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