Artek Aalto table 81B, birch – white laminate

Artek’s table 81B is Alvar Aalto’s timeless design from 1935. The main material of the rectangular dining table is solid birch, and the tabletop is coated with easy-care laminate.

Artek tables are based on different combinations of Alvar Aalto’s L-legs and tabletops. Aalto introduced the bent L-leg for the first time in 1933, and it became a standard component in his furniture designs. Judging his importance as a designer and architect, Aalto considered the development of the L-leg as his greatest achievement – he even called the L-leg “the little sister of the architectonic column”. The development of the L-leg was revolutionary because it solved the problem of attaching legs directly to the tabletop in a completely new way – the leg could be fastened with screws directly to the tabletop, and the result was a simple but very solid structure.