Muurame church, located in

Muurame Muurame is a municipality of Finland, located south-west of Jyväskylä. Muurame itself is located between two lakes, Lake Päijänne and Lake Muuratjärvi. These two lakes are connected to each other via River Muurame. All together there are 37 ...

, central

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

, was designed by the Finnish architect

Alvar Aalto Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto (; 3 February 1898 – 11 May 1976) was a Finnish architect and designer. His work includes architecture, furniture, textiles and glassware, as well as sculptures and paintings. He never regarded himself as an artist, see ...

, and completed in 1929.

Architecture

It was the first Aalto-designed church, and the only one of his many church designs in the 1920s, to be built, and represents his transition from

Nordic Classicism Nordic Classicism was a style of architecture that briefly blossomed in the Nordic countries (Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland) between 1910 and 1930. Until a resurgence of interest for the period during the 1980s (marked by several scholarly ...

to the Functionalist style he is mostly known for. As a transitional work, the Muurame church has been undervalued among Aalto's designs by many critics, and even the architect himself called it his 'aberration of youth' (''nuoruudensynti''). The church's elongated-

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

, single-aisle design and ''

campanile A bell tower is a tower that contains one or more bells, or that is designed to hold bells even if it has none. Such a tower commonly serves as part of a Christian church, and will contain church bells, but there are also many secular bell tower ...

'' (belfry) were influenced by Aalto's honeymoon trip to Italy a few years earlier, and the churches he saw there.

Renovation

The church was comprehensively restored in 2016 to its original design. Most notably, the interior colour scheme was changed from its pre-renovation white and light wood — often associated with Aalto's minimalist style — to the original, more colourful one consisting of bright blue and red ceiling and dark grey fixtures.

References

External links

Muurame Church on Alvar Aalto Foundation website
{{Commons category, Muurame Church Alvar Aalto buildings Alvar Aalto churches Churches completed in 1929 Lutheran churches in Finland Muurame