Introduction : Aalto studies and modernism in housing -- The silent central personage: the architect Aino Marsio-Aalto -- Towards a happier society: Aino and Alvar Aalto and Turku in the 1920s -- From Alberti to Aalto: the trinity of domicile, family and architecture -- The ideal image of the home: the Aalto house and the homes of Aino and Alvar Aalto -- The interior design of the Villa Mairea -- A library of art?: the Villa Mairea and notes on the gender of the art collector -- Aesthetics or politics: the "danger" of Finnish architecture and design during the so-called first Republic of 1919-1944.