Ilmari Tapiovaara (1914-1999)
interior architect
Ilmari Tapiovaara graduated in 1937 as interior architect from the department of furniture design of the Central School of Arts and Crafts. After graduating, he travelled to France to visit the Paris World’s Fair. On this trip, he obtained an assistant’s position for six months at the office of Le Corbusier.
In 1938, Tapiovaara was engaged by the Asko company, Finland’s largest furniture factory, as designer and artistic director. In the autumn of 1939, a housing fair was staged in Helsinki, which, however, had to be closed before long because of the risk of war. The exhibition featured a multipurpose set of furniture designed by Tapiovaara for Asko. In 1941, Tapiovaara became the artistic and commercial director of the Keravan Puuteollisuus furniture company. In 1946-47, he and his wife Annikki Tapiovaara designed furniture for the new Domus Academica student-housing complex in Helsinki. One of the best-known items among those designs is the Domus chair, which began to be produced in series. Tapiovaara’s Lukki chair was meant for the student housing facilities of the Helsinki University of Technology, which were built in the early 1950s. The innovation of this chair design was its combination of form-pressed plywood and curved metal tubing. In 1951, Tapiovaara and his wife established their own office and the couple designed for several firms and companies.
During the Second World War, Tapiovaara served in East Karelia, where his work included the planning and realization of construction work and the mechanical production of structural elements. He designed dugout shelters, canteens, saunas, furniture and utility items for the Finnish army. In the late stages of the war, he guided crafts activities among servicemen by designing models.
Ilmari Tapiovaara also worked abroad in various capacities. In 1952-53, he was a professor at the school of design of the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago and he worked for a while in the office of Mies van der Rohe. In the late 1950s, Tapiovaara went to Paraguay in connection with a UN development project to design furniture and in the mid-1970s he worked on a similar project in Mauritius. He also served in an expert capacity in former Yugoslavia in developing a furniture and joinery industry centre. Tapiovaara also designed furniture for Italian and Swedish clients among others.
Tapiovaara admired the works of Alvar Aalto and wanted carry on Aalto’s ideas in his own design work. This was evident in applying wood to the idiom of functionalism and industrial production and in the fact that Tapiovaara adopted the principle of social equality of functionalism. In his designs, Tapiovaara always sought to create a humane, well-lit and warm dwelling environment. The furniture designed by him were always part of a whole, with the architecture as their starting point
Alongside dozens of chairs and other furniture, mostly for public premises, Tapiovaara also designed interiors for numerous banks, offices, hotels and shops since the 1940s. These works included eleven business premises for the Kaivotalo building (1957), the Olivetti showroom (1954), the Hotel Marski (1960), as well as Lauttasaari Church including lighting and ecclesiastical objects (1957) and the Hotel Intercontinental (1971). All these projects were in Helsinki.
Exhibition design was one area of Tapiovaara’s extensive oeuvre. In 1957, Finland’s first exhibition of industrial design was held along with the annual exhibition of the Finnish Society of Craft and Design. The exhibition design was by Tapiovaara. Other exhibitions of industrial design planned by Tapiovaara were the rare showings held in Moscow and Tallinn in 1961. His solo exhibitions were Kuutio (Cube) 73 and Muoto (Form) 78.
Tapiovaara was head of the department of interior design at the Institute of Applied Arts and senior instructor at the department from 1951 to 1954, and teacher of industrial design in 1954-1956. He sought to reform teaching towards industrial product design with the aid of international and American examples. Tapiovaara also taught interior design at the Helsinki University of Technology from 1964 to 1968.
Ilmari Tapiovaara was awarded a total of six gold medals at the Milan triennials of 1951, 1954, 1957, 1960 and 1964. He received Good Design Award in Chicago in 1951, the Pro Finlandia medal in 1959, the Finnish State Design Prize in 1971 and the Furniture Prize of the SIO Interior Architects’ Association of Finland in 1990.
Auli Suortti-Vuorio
Bibliography:
Ilmari Tapiovaara. Sisustusarkkitehti. Inredningsarkitekt. Interior Architect. Teksti / Text Jarno Peltonen. Taideteollisuusmuseo. Konstindustrimuseet. Museum of Applied Arts. Helsinki 1984. Exhibition catalogue.
Ilmari Tapiovaara. Interior Architect. Ed. by Lily Kane. New York 2001.
Hagelstam, Wenzel, Uusi antiikkikirja 1900-1980. WSOY. Hämeenlinna 2003.
Korvenmaa, Pekka, Ilmari Tapiovaara. Santa et Cole. Barcelona 1997.
Articles on Ilmari Tapiovaara in Form Function Finland:
Runeberg, Tutta, Export design. Finland exports planning, ideas and training. FFF vol. 2/1983.
Paatero, Kristiina, Ilmari Tapiovaara – master of the chair. The goal was to create a human environment. FFF vol. 4/1984
Photos:
Nana chair
Tapiovaara designed the Nana chair for the Merivaara company in 1957. It is a light and graceful all-purpose chair suited to both the home and public use. The legs are of black or chrome-plated metal and are attached in a scissors-type configuration. The seat is of wood and it was made in different colours. A leather seat was also available. Tapiovaara also designed a transport package for the chair. The Nana chair is again available through resumed production.
Domus chair
Domus was designed as a desk chair for the Domus Academica student-housing complex in Helsinki. It also served as an all-purpose chair in other types of space, as all the items of furniture for the student housing buildings were designed for multiple uses. The student was taken into account in the design of the chair: it had be comfortable for sitting, and it had to support the back. The chair required little space and was stackable. It was made of birch by the Keravan Puuteollisuus company. Domus was a success both in Finland and abroad, and it was also sold in the United States. Tapiovaara also designed a package for this chair and was responsible for its marketing, export showings, and the graphic design of the sales campaigns. Over five million Domus chairs have been made.
