Page "Finlandia Hall" Paragraph 5

As regards the exterior Carrara marble cladding, over the years the 3 cm thick marble slabs had tended to curve: the slabs were too thin and were affected by the harsh winter weather conditions and pollution.

The Alvar Aalto office and the National Board of Antiquities investigated the various options, including replacing the slabs with durable Finnish grey granite slabs.

However, it was finally decided to replace all the exterior slabs with new Carrara marble ones, but in a slightly thicker dimension, and attached to a concrete tile backing.

The large reparation project was completed in 1998: however, by 2006 many of these slabs had already begun to curve.

The same problem has also affected other buildings in Helsinki by Aalto in which he used Carrara marble slabs ( e. g., The Enso-Gutzeit Building )