Light as a 'medical instrument'

A view of the inner space: the corridor and the dining hall

Alvar Aalto's starting point for the design of the Paimio sanatorium in Southwest Finland, was to make the building itself a contributor to the healing process. He liked to call the building a "medical instrument".
For instance, light was considered a vehicle of positive feelings and particular attention was paid to the design of the inside, especially the patient bedrooms.
Aalto was able to bring natural light into the rooms and give the patients the feeling that they were in control of the space.

Also the colour scheme of the patients' rooms was related to light. Aalto had his own ideas about the ceilings of the patients' rooms, for example. "The ceiling of the room should be the colour of the sky", and because the ceiling was painted in darker tones, the lighting had to be arranged so that the part of the ceiling which reflected the light had to be painted in lighter tones.
Another example is the dining hall, that is designed with an eye on the natural lighting.

On the window side there is a double-height space, so that natural light filters into the farthest corner of the room and there are sun blinds outside to prevent glare.