“Thank you Alvar for this lesson of Power, Personality and Light” wrote a Mexican architect Armando Birlain on the guest book of Town Hall.

Armando stayed in the guest room and worked a long evening in the meeting room – maybe a little bit too long, because he caused also an alarm. But this tells to me that the Town Hall is inspiring environment to work, you loose the sense of time and are able to focus to your work. This is a good forecast for the idea of residence apartments that start to be ready for booking! We had also time to visit local cafe Table En Bois and enjoy Jaana’s delicious food and drinks. There was a temptation to sneak to see the Experimental house, but maybe we were able to resist temptation – or not 🙂

Armando was the last visitor for this busy end of the week after winter. A large group of students from Savonia University of Applied Sciences visited building and were also the first customers in my new “museum shop”. Two Japanese architects came to visit and an, also Japanese, student joined the tour just a little bit after they arrived.

Also an other architect from far away stayed in a guest room this week. We had a nice chat with this Australian architect about Aalto, Finnish flora and climate over a breakfast that I had set up in the Town Hall. It is my priviledge to have these chats with architects all over the world. Even when they know a lot about architecture and are known of their own work and respected architects they explain me the simple things that make Aalto so great. Often architects remember their own studies and how they for example have built models of this very building: Town Hall.

Japanese guests had already met in Helsinki – visiting the Aalto’s home and studio.  So the routes of visitors quite often follow the pattern: Helsinki – Jyväskylä – Säynätsalo – even Rovaniemi, Seinäjoki, Imatra, Noormarkku… So many places and buildings to see in Finland! Project called “Network of Aalto Towns” has just been started and more and more “Aalto Towns” want to join the network. I think that the Säynätsalo Town Hall would be a perfect center for all Aalto Towns, gathering information, planning routes for visitors and spreading the knowledge of Aalto’s heritage.

And the last visitors for Sunday were local. Two artists, photographer and designer, will put their work to public in Town Hall. But about that I will write more soon!