BAGH-E NAZAR
Year:2019 | Volume:16 | Issue:71 |Papers Count:7

Nowadays, the sociology of urban space has been the focus of researchers in urban planning and design fields. This has caused the cities and urban spaces within these cities to be considered more than the bodies in them and the relatively large structures in which they were built. In comparison with other sociological factors, vitality in urban spaces is a factor that has been given special attention. This kind of expectations would arise immediately after the introduction of the urban space in the minds of citizens. In fact, one of the most promising expectations of people from urban spaces is the dynamism and liveliness of that space, which is understood as the concept of urban vitality. It seems that the factor that plays a vital role in creating this vitality is the existence of activities in the context of urban spaces. The research tries to investigate the effect of existing activity patterns on the vitality of urban spaces. The Vali Asr Crossroad in Tehran have been identified as a key point in the heart of Tehran and in the structure of Tehran, and It is a totally urban space full of activity patterns, but studies show that vitality in this space is not at the optimal level. For this reason, the study of vitality based on activity patterns in this important urban space is investigated. In the analytical section, a questionnaire based on a conceptual model was designed and then a regression model was used to analyze the results. The results show that the factor of performance as a vital variable in promoting social interactions and as a result of creating vitality at the Vali Asr crossroad plays an important role. Meanwhile, the two factors of static / dynamic activity and diversity at Vali Asr crossroad are factors weakening social interactions and urban vitality.

Place branding has been adopted by policymakers and decision makers since 1990s to promote the place competition forattracting financial and human capital. This concept is discussed in various scientific disciplines. Each field has conceptualized this concept in a different way. Thus, the present study attempts to clarify the dimensions of this concept with a step-by-step approach. The aim of this study is to provide a background and theoretical basis for the concept of “ place brand” and “ place branding” in a conceptual model which clarify the different dimensions of place branding. Therefore, in this study a depth analysis will be done in the literature to explain the concepts, approaches, models, scales and methods of assessment. Descriptive-analytic research method was used in this present study. The results showed that despite extensive theoretical literature about place brand and place branding, yet there is no consensus on it. The variety of disciplines involved in this topic (such as economics and marketing, social sciences, political science, environmental sciences) reflects the various dimensions that have been added to the concept of place branding. In this research, three periods for place brand is depicted: past, present and future. In this progress, the concept of place branding has evolved from a marketing tool to an approach to involving various dimensions of urban planning and management. In these periods, place branding has changed from a monotonic phenomenon which is based on visual and tangible dimensions and a top-down process to the multifaceted, interdisciplinary, interactive, and collaborative concept. Finally, by summarizing the concepts which is explored and refined, the theoretical and conceptual model for place branding is presented.

The sacredness of plants among nations has led to the apparent and latent implications of these elements in the arts and architecture of various nations. In ancient Persia, the impacts of plant motifs can be seen in the architectural ornamentation, which is also prevalent in other nations. Problem statement and research aim: The current study pursues to find the inherent concepts of plant motifs used in the pre-Islamic Iran architecture and to understand the impacts of pre-Islamic architecture on the architecture of Umayyad and Abbasid periods. In this regard, the symbolic and mythological concepts of plants such as lotus flowers, acanthus, and various trees such as palm and vine, which are commonly used in pre-Islamic Iranian architecture and Islamic architecture, have been deeply scrutinized. Research Method: This research aims at interpreting the perpetual influence of these plants on the common beliefs and the architecture of the two aforementioned periods and it tries to seek the reasons for conveyance of these motifs from pre-Islamic architecture to Islamic era. Therefore, using the interdisciplinary study methodology, this study aims at comparing the motifs of prominent pre-Islamic buildings of the Achaemenid period (Persepolis) and the Sassanid period (Ctesiphon palace, Taq-e Bostan and Bishapur Palace) with those of Umayyad period (such as Qobbat Al-Sakherah mosque, Al-Hayr palace, Al-Mshatta palace, and Kherbat Al-Mafjar palace), and Abbasid period (including the Belkoura palace, Seymareh mosque and Noh Gonbad mosque). After interpreting the buildings historically by referring to various texts, the common implications of plant motifs were revealed and their manifestations in the architecture of both historical periods are deeply analyzed and discussed. Conclusion: The results show that the existence of noble concepts such as purity, clarity and sacred force of life, knowledge and wisdom observed at plant motifs is the main reason for their use in architecture, which convey the same implications in the architecture of both periods. Moreover, it is deduced that the use of different motifs such as palmette (palm leaves), lotus leaves in Al-Hayr palace and Kherbat al-mafjar palace, the vine leaves and grape clusters in Qobbat Al-Sakhreh, as well as the triangular and circular forms in Al-Mshatta palace indicate the presence of Iranian art and architecture in the architecture of Umayyad and Abbasid periods. In addition, the geographical adjacency, believing in the same ideals, language, art and partnership in the creation and instructions of scientific schools are other reasons for the conveyance of motifs from Iranian architecture and culture to the Islamic architecture, especially Umayyad and Abbasid periods.

Improving environmental quality is interwoven with enhancing its meaning. Semantic factors are applied to evaluate quality and the indicators of the two concepts of quality and meaning overlap. However, theorists’ viewpoints toward these two concepts are diverse so that some consider meaning as a quality indicator, while others refer to quality merely as the outcome of the presentational aspect of meaning. This has led to an ambiguity in determining the relationship between the aspects of these two concepts and, as a result, made it difficult to consent to what is implied as meaning or quality. The current study aims at clarifying the differences and the common points of the aspects and factors of the two concepts of meaning and quality, and determining their relationship, so that an agreement could be reached on these two fundamental concepts in both architecture hypothesis and criticism. Applying logical reasoning, this research defines a coherent general framework based on human-environment interaction, in which the position of each of the two concepts of meaning and quality is explained. Also, cognitive aspects of the environment, using the method of content analysis and literature coding, are categorized as the basis for matching and comparing the aspects of the two concepts. These two frameworks would function as the basis for search of and response to the ambiguities in the relationship between these two which, ultimately, would lead to the statement. In human-environment interaction, meaning undergoes perception and cognition, while quality is judged and evaluated. What is evaluated as the quality is the presentation and the final result of the cognition of the threefold aspects of the meaning, including functional, social and responsive. If the responsive meaning of an environment bears a positive affective load, the environment is considered to possess a good quality.

Any spatial organization with the ability to make internal changes can answer extra demands of its users at different times. Therefore, it can possess a better performance than to the performance of single-functional spatial organizations. The main purpose of this research is to measure the flexibility of spatial system of houses using the space syntax in three traditional, traditional-contemporary and contemporary patterns in Qazvin. To achieve this goal, on the one hand, various manifestations of the flexibility of the spatial system of the house and, on the other hand, features of the space syntax were identified based on valid books and papers; Subsequently, flexibility expressions were evaluated and analyzed with a number of architectural concepts related to space syntax through descriptive-analytical and logical research method. In the present research and in this theory, the measurement tools are the justification Charts, the DEPTH MAP software and the data extracted from these two. Results of the research indicated that the influence of the spatial system on the development of the traditional houses was much higher than traditional-contemporary and contemporary instances. Also, most of contemporary houses, regardless of their construction area, possess the equal rate of flexibility in their spatial system. However, with a change in construction area in houses of traditional and traditional-contemporary era, the flexibility will face change.

Mountain is the place of gods in mythical thoughts and it is a place for revelations and conversations of the God with the prophets in important religions. But mountain itself is of utmost importance in Iran plateau due to the geographical condition of this territory and the fact that mountain has been the source of water. In Avesta, the book of the Zoroastrianism, the term mountain has been repeatedly used respectfully and the holy Quran has often highlighted its importance. As it is mentioned in the statement of the problem section of this article, the existence of water resources have been the main and preliminary factor for the establishment of the majority of Iranian cities and villages on the hillsides and mountain slopes but there have been other important influential factors like the pleasant weather of the mountain, the defensive role of the mountain against the natural and human disasters and the existence of the livelihood capacities as well as an array of the other factors that heavily affected the formation of these residential places and the continuation of their construction in the mountain sides. These functions have intensified the importance of mountains in Iranian lives. However, the significance of mountain has declined in the course of time for various reasons, especially because of the advent of modernity and technology; which accordingly, the meaning of mountain which was once a vital element, has been changed. Considering the current issue, the aim of the present study was to investigate the importance of the mountain in the course of the time in Iranian literature using a qualitative method for studying the historical documents through historical investigations of those poetic samples of poets who had had a brilliant position in the construction of Iranian language and memory. Later on, changes in the poets’ approaches and attitudes toward mountain were explored. As it is mentioned in the statement of the problem section of the present study, considering the importance of modernity’ s entry to the mental position of people, the extent of the modernity`s effect on the meaning of the mountain in poetry was also under investigation. The results of the study indicate-that the semantic position of the mountain has been changed during the time in the poets’ minds, especially in blank poems that are stemmed from the modernity’ s entry into Iran. The substantial approach adopted by the blank verse poets toward mountain is mostly objective. Moreover, the investigations are reflective of the idea that there is another factor influencing the changes in the meaning of the nature and mountain before the entry of modernity into the contemporary poetry that might be even more important than the modernity itself, which is the poets and intellectuals’ repugnance of the Qajar and the Safaviyya eras due to the decline of the power of cultural generation and inappropriate retrospectively of the spiritual thoughts.