Alvar Aalto Cultural Centre

1962 cultural centre by the Finnish modernist Alvar Aalto

The Alvar Aalto Cultural Centre is one of the great pieces of postwar Scandinavian architecture in Germany. Aalto won the commission in a 1958 competition; the building opened in 1962. The fan-shaped library at one end is the most famous element, but the auditoriums, the curved white facades, and the way the building turns the corner of its irregular site all reward attention.

It still functions as a public library and adult education centre. Anyone with an interest in twentieth-century architecture should stop, even just to walk through the lobby and the library reading rooms. It is one of the strongest reasons to visit Wolfsburg.

things to do sight architecture
A story
Aalto was asked to design the building because Wolfsburg's young city authorities, conscious of the place's Nazi origins, wanted a distinguished foreign modernist to establish the cultural tone of the postwar town. The result is one of Aalto's most fluent late works and a building of national significance.