HOVIATESHAHR
Year:2016 | Volume:10 | Issue:25|Papers Count:10

In the fifteenth century, the Safavids converted to Shi’ism and established Shi’a (The second largest denomination of Islam, after Sunni) as the official religion of their empire. The Islamic concept of the Ideal City, formed according to the Garden of Eden, was taken into consideration in the Safavid period. Gardens as parables of Heaven were often used as composing elements in urban design. This idea resulted in the formation of a powerful method of city planning that drew its conclusions from Shi’a ideology about the human place in the physical world and the Islamic concept of the Ideal City. Urban designers used the ideas of Heaven in small and large-scale gardens and used heavenly features as composition elements to create the city. Thus, the city was formed as an image of Heaven. It was a suitable place for people as surrogates of God in the world.No doubt, Safavid era should be considered as the most shinny period in the history of Iranian urbanization and Architecture. Thus, in various ways, the factors that have been implicated in its development are reviewed and discussed. The teachings of Isfahan school are influenced by the intellectual wisdom of Shiism and they are the most effective factors which cause the dignity and progress of Safavid art and architecture comparing other eras. Ruling of the Safavid dynasty and legitimizing the Shiism, Indeed, Shia Safavids recovered from the previous state and then it became a majority from a minority. Therefore, evaluation of Safavid Shiite teachings and Isfahan school in garden-constructing and urban development is essential in this study. Emphasizing on the basic elements of configuring the physical identity and its effective role, the first part of this article deals with Islamic Iranian tradition of Safavid era. In other sections of this article, the relationships of urbanization and garden-constructing in the Safavid era and the rise of an Idea called as Garden City (Bagh-shar) and the factors involved in shaping them will be explained.By studying about existent historic gardens, Persian Gardens are divided into different types. The way people use special physical and functional features could also be used as a scale of this division. It seems Iranian gardener artist during different historical periods, tried increasing the relationship between human, nature and function.Isfahan as the most famous and magnificent of the historic Garden City is examined and the style of using elements of the Persian garden landscaping in its urban structure would be explained. The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between religious beliefs and the Shi' a Safavids in the shaping and emergence of the idea the Garden City by the Safavids. Using an analytical-descriptive method of research, this paper tries to assess the qualitative data by means of an inductive method. Data collecting is realized using a library method. The results of this paper indicate the quality of relating the idea of the Safavid Persian Garden City and the pattern of Iranian garden influenced by Islamic beliefs of Shiite Muslims in shaping it.

The concept of identity is one of the most complex issues in the humanities such that its roots can be traced on the philosophy, psychology and sociology. The application of this concept in the field of architecture was expanded after World War II, in the 50's and after the outbreak of the criticism of modern architecture. Despite extensive discussions that have taken place, this concept is still a matter of concern, especially in developing countries. Vernacular architecture in these countries is a symbol of cultural identity in contrast with the pressures of globalization and Invasion of Western Civilization. The main question of this study is the recognition of the concept and effective principles of identity in architecture that is done through the analysis of the viewpoints of theorists.The views of theorists with the concept of identity and architecture can be seen in two total forms. The first one is a process that architecture is considered as a symbol of self or society and in the second form, building’s identity is known as the features or meanings of built environment. Anyway, the identity of built environment has deep relation with human identity and is considered as a part of an individual's personality.Definition of architecture as identity, associated with concepts such as personalization, territory or sense of belonging. In contrast, analyzing the Identity in a building is a challenging issue that theorists have used different terms to describe it. They have used from different terms like character of space, sense of place, meaning of built environment or physical features. A number of theories have considered identity as a part of meaning or sense of place, while some others have defined meaning or sense of place as a part of identity. Although these terms have different meaning, but all of them have mentioned some special features of built environment that make meaning, cause uniqueness and distinguish a place from the other environment.Therefore, in this study the concept of meaning has used as the identity of built environment and the distinctions between definitions are explained as the levels of meaning. Accordingly, four levels of meaning have defined, including basic meaning and form, functional meaning, symbolic and reference meaning, emotional and sentimental meaning. Perception of identity and meaning occurs by common significance and the level of meaning is related to the level of connection between the human and built environment and is defined in the process of interaction between these two elements.The interactive process is defined in a communication model between architect, built environment and user. Base on this model and theorist’s viewpoints, some principles have defined like oneness, continuity, innovation and creativity, coordination between form and function and interaction between past and future that could help the meaning of the building to be legible. In this study also has explained that the architecture identity conclude from understanding ourselves and our environment and has suggested that architects must pay attention to context, climatic change, culture differentiation and human needs, in design process.

«Quality of life« is an important concept and most thinkers in the past have been considered it. Although some philosophers such as Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, Descartes, Habermas, Rawls and others have talked about the quality of human life, but this concept as a matter of scientific research can be found only in social, economic, health and psychological studies since 1930s and in architecture and urban studies since 1960s.The «Quality of life« approach arose in the wake of criticism of the early twentieth century events and continued until the recent century, with a specific nature in each period. The main origins of them are appearance of «Standard of Living« term; change the «Standard« to «Quality« and the «Quality of Life Movement«. These phrases exemplify continued attempts to represent human reality and welfare in objective terms and to rationalize collective decision making; but the passage from one to the other shows a shift in public discourse from individual life to community and even to global subjects.In fact, this shift from standard to quality denotes a widening of our perspective on human being and life, a more holistic and comprehensive approach to architecture and urban planning. So the phrase «Quality of Life« gives voice to our concern with the nonmaterial dimension of wellbeing, beyond the basic needs of the individual.The purpose of this article is to understand the different approaches of this concept in any time and paying attention to the evolution of that in the contemporary era to solve the problems ahead efficiently. Also, it determines the dimensions and the nature of the takes to be undertaken.This article explores what the evolution of Quality of Life approach tells us about architecture and urbanism and about built environment in general since 1930s. Therefore, the strategy in this article is the study of history, issues and factors affecting the appearance of «Quality of Life« approach and explanation its evolution in the contemporary architecture and urbanism. Also the method is explaining past events, analyze, and explore the relationship between them to recognize the nature of this approach.To this end, the paper contains four main parts: The first part is an introduction of the «quality of life« concept and its development process. The second part, as a literature review, is devoted for viewing the architectural and urban quality of life factors in the appearance of this thought. The third part will discuss the evolution of «Quality of Life« concept in the modern period and in the fourth part as a result we will face with the status of this approach at the end of this century and the further developments.Regarding the evolution of the «quality of life« thought in the second half of the last century until now, the future of this approach in architecture and urbanism can be pursued in the globalization studies. With more surveys in this field, this idea can be seen in the environmental different aspects and can be applied in the implementation of this idea.

Today, due to increasing the population of large cities such as Tehran, the demand for housing, has been increased. The imbalance between supply and demand of housing has increased the price of housing which caused citizens to live in small apartments. This issue reduces the quality of life in these homes. The quality of the human environment has an enormous effect on his health. Most research in the field of health psychology has shown that, there is a direct relationship between the quality of the residential environment and social harms such as suicide, mental disorders, drug addiction and criminality. One of these qualitative factors is the quality of daylight. Being exposed to adequate daylight has an enormous effect on the health of body and the human spirit. Due to the high density and compressibility of buildings and also aerosols and air pollution that cause low access to daylight, attention to the appropriate use of daylight in the cities such as Tehran is more critical. On the other hand, in tall apartments, residents have not access to some open spaces such as yard and during the day, they live in closed space of apartment. Therefore, the design of windows as the only source of daylight are very important. So, the conditions of suitable daylight in residential areas and the way to create it, are considered in this article.The study area of this article is small apartments in Tehran. Because of the high price of housing in Tehran, these apartments are considered by many citizens. Regarding to the limitation in access to the yard and outdoor living space, attention to improvement of environmental quality, especially attention to daylight is more important.The determining standard characteristics of daylight in residential areas is one part of this research. In this field with studying credible sources and standards, required data is collected. The most important index is a daylight factor that is equal to the average daylight in interior space in the proportion to outdoor daylight. Appropriate daylight factor for bedroom, work and study rooms, living room and kitchen respectively is equal to 1%, 5%, 2.5% and 2%. Identifying the common spaces of small apartments in Tehran and theirs area, is the next step. For this purpose a number of small residential apartments in the various parts of Tehran were selected and the different dimensions of theirs spaces were investigated. Finally, to determine the proper size of windows, the daylight simulation and calculation software (DIALUX) has been used. In this software, Tehran's geographic information (latitude and longitude) and the status of air pollution in Tehran and the data related to glass of window (common windows that used in this apartments) such as transparency coefficient and the reflection coefficient of glass, were imported and according to the standard daylight factor of bedroom, living room and kitchen, for each of these spaces, the calculations have been performed and the optimal window size for each of these spaces in proportion to the internal surface area is presented.

This article is derived from the Ph.D. thesis of the author which is about the role of spirituality in the Iranian home and architecture (here the word home has a double meaning both as an architectural concept and a spiritual one). Proceeding to the topic Meaning and Spirituality both in the broader context of philosophy and wisdom and the narrower one of art and architecture is preceded by defining some basic concepts like appearance and inward principles and then introducing four cognitive levels according to their epistemological importance (chart one). To understand spirituality, the levels of human awareness and cognition must be explained thoroughly; since they are human’s intellectual activities at hand. For the very reason that the four cognitive levels are man’s intellectual achievements (intellect either in the form of logos or reason), logos and reasons are explained afterwards and the relations between these two are shown from several different perspectives (to which the second chart is dedicated). In the first part of this essay and as a theoretical base for discourse, the four cognitive levels and types of knowledge, function as a means for the explanation of meaning and spirituality and in the third chart the relation between meaning and spirituality in wisdom and philosophy and on the other hand with logos and reason is presented.In the second part the professional field of art and architecture is investigated and the spiritual art is defined. Spiritual art is substantially an inward based on reflection and contemplation thus Persian art and subsequently Persian architecture is dependent on these activities. Therefore, those intrinsic matters like states of sharia, creed and truth which run through spirituality and spiritual art transmit into Persian art and the architecture, navigating the mystic from the world of appearances to that of numinous. This centripetal movement holds man’s being towards god. This attitude (being towards god) is proposed to be the sign for presentness of "Aan" (a spiritual momentum or better saying a very special spiritual state). An "aan" which belongs to the mystical world, achieved in revelations and intuitions of the artist would be then expressed in his art. Moreover, this is a hint showing that the heart of spiritual art at the same time is simultaneously present and absent. So briefly speaking, a spiritual artist is he who has an "Aan" in his works. This "Aan" is immediately grasped by the inner eye or intuition of the beholder for it is emanated by the same exact source, to say, heart and soul.At the end of this essay and as a summery, it is concluded that in Persian wisdom, meaning and spirituality are equal and for that exact reason are equal in Persian art and architecture too. That’s why a compulsion to obtain a certain degree of spirituality, for client, architect and beholder is evident as a precondition for achieving harmony with Persian architecture. Finally, it should be mentioned that an analytical expressive methodology, with quality based methods are used in this research.

Studies on perceived quality of urban environments, look for ways of establishing harmonious relationship between people and cities. In the contemporary city, this harmony cannot be seen properly in the relationship between people and elements that are important in urban legibility. Urban landmarks are one kind of those elements that we observe a chaotic attendance for them in Iran’s capital, Tehran. The most common definitions of landmarks indicate that they are some recognizable natural or man-made features used for navigation, features that stands out from their near environment and are often visible from long distances. In urban studies as well as in geography, a landmark is furthermore defined as an external point of reference that helps orienting in a familiar or unfamiliar environment. Also, it should be noted that we know urban landmarks as significant elements in both urban landscape and image. They are conceivably the most fundamental pieces of spatial information as they are used for a wide collection of tasks related to the description, understanding of and reasoning about our physical environment. In this paper, we propose a conceptual framework for legibility factors of urban landmarks along urban structural pathways with emphasis on form, function and meaning. In other words, this paper is to answer the question "which factors play the most important role in changing an element, building, etc. to an urban landmark along structural pathways?" Therefore, in this qualitative research, after considering and summarizing the literature review, a conceptual framework based on the ideas of Lynch, Appleyard and Rapoport was developed. Also, people were requested to specify urban landmarks they know on a simplified map of the street. Then we identified the most important landmarks (along Vali’asr street in Tehran) based on analyzing people's mental maps. After all, main factors/ features of the landmarks were extracted and summarized. The important feature of this study is not only considering urban landmark as a phenomenon consists of the dialectical relationship between the three components (form, function and meaning), but this is also going to propose a typological analysis of the factors mentioned above and their variables. Reviewing literature on urban landmarks shows that the main emphasis of relevant studies is more on formal and visual aspects rather than functional and semantic. So the focus of the paper on the meaning of landmarks tried to be comprehensive and novel. The results of this study are to be used primarily for urban designers, urban planners and architects to understand what features are important for people to identify an element as a landmark during the time, and help them to decrease the current chaos in urban landscape especially in developing countries urban areas. The results show that functional and formal aspects of landmarks play a more important role, respectively, in the legibility of urban landmarks. Also type of use, intensity of use and visibility have greatest impact on identifying those elements. On the other hand, we observed that functional, formal and formal-functional landmarks are, respectively, main types in the case study.

Public transportation system, especially the subway transit system of metro is one of the main strategies of TOD movement towards achieving sustainable urban transportation. Subway transit system based on this movement, in addition to reducing traffic and use of personal vehicles, increases human-oriented public spaces. Metro stations can play an important role in the efficiency and attractiveness of this transportation system. Therefore, public spaces could be changed to underground urban spaces by using some strategies. This issue could be more important and essential in Tehran as the capital, most crowded and the biggest city of Iran. It’s seems that by using public arts in Tehran metro stations, could affect the desirability of them.This study has used an analytical method and is based on quantitative- qualitative approaches. In collecting data survey method (questionnaire) had been used and Case studies are Vliasr and Tajrish metro stations. These two stations are located in memorable parts of Tehran, have special identity, special visual and functional properties. A total of 320 questionnaires in Vliasr and Tajrish metro stations are statistical society of this study. Multivariate linear regression, Durbin-Watson exam and comparing quantitative and qualitative results were used as the data analyzing methods.The result shows that using public art in metro stations could excite the curiosity of travelers, attracts more travelers and make a more familiar environment. Therefore, they spend more time in underground spaces of the city. So using public arts in Tehran metro stations could be effective in desirability of them. Among all types of public arts, fixed (54.9% in vali-Asr station and 63.6% in Tajrish station) and motion ones (52.3% in Vali-Asr station and 51.7% in Tajrish station) are more effective on desirability of Tehran metro stations. Among various cases of public arts "using the main hall of the station to display photographs and paintings of artists'", ’" Establishment of photography stations with fixed captures and elements", "availability of wall-paintings and wall reliefs"and "announcing programs of Tehran cinema and theaters by displaying the posters in station platform" can be more effective in these stations. Although by using some common types of public arts in Tehran metro stations could improve the desirability of them, but each station according to its location and design has special identity and atmosphere that seeks to some special and appropriate strategies. As follows, exhibiting of pictures and caricature of theater running programs, changing displayed arts in station hall according to seasons and special ceremonies, using dynamic and creative textures for pavements, use of peoples portraits or autographs to cover some walls in Vali-Asr station and play classic music in order to calm the passengers and make distances between platform to gates shorter, decreasing unused spaces and hidden corners by "picture stops" that indorse people to pause and leads to some unplanned interactions, use of soft components such as water and flowers through creative furniture and by creative methods, motion pictures and advertisements in Tajrish station and are some of strategies for improve the desirability of these stations.

Administrative Justice Court due to address complaints and objections of the people pleading with state agents or units or regulations officially started its work in 1981. Also urban development higher council of Iran established as the highest legislative authority of city in the year 1964 with the aim of coordinating programs with urban development duties such as consideration of approval and regulation city planning. From the beginning of establishment of The Administrative Justice Court so far, 60 demands of cancellation of legislation registered and 24 votes has been accepted (40 percent) and led to invalidate ratification. Assessment cancellation legislation and its effects on development of projects and lack of construction like the realization of the public -services-facilities infrastructure, and communication network can be an important guide to provide essentials of codification of projects and policies.A method that used in this research is practical. The research method is descriptive-analytic. In this article evaluate the reasons for the annulment of decisions of urban development and architecture higher council of Iran and discussed the matter of revocation of approvals approach was evaluated and then proposed solution is presented. In the following, the ways to reduce revocation of approvals due to non-compliance legal issues, with the consideration of proprietary rights of the people were suggested. The study of non-compliance with legislation revocation confusion on the proprietary rights of individuals and the rights of the people over the years has been gained and revocation of approvals has led to the attainment of the owners complained.The absence of representatives of economic sectors (Ministry of Economy and Finance) and services (ministries of education, health), and registration of ownership and legal documents, cause some problems. The lack of stable income, in charge of public services (such as lack of funding and credit for land administration, education, health) caused land acquisition and implementation services in the legal deadline and created many problems for the owners and custodians.In this discussion contradicts spectrum of dimensions and influential activities in the arena and city assessment and challenges caused by the optimistic development plans and construction and solution of the proposal has been presented. The results show that the realization of the highest percentage cancellation legislation related to the votes of the commission Article five about license, the separation of classes and increase the effectiveness and change.Reasons for revocation of approvals of urban development and architecture higher council of Iran are: Lack of a central process in the spirit prevailing attitude in planning and urban development plans.Lower incidence rates of maintenance plans and urban development plans approved by the lack of useful information and at the micro and macro scales.Lack of proper analysis over time due to deficiencies in project management and lack of integrated programs in urban management system.And finally weakness in determining the amount of the contribution and participation of socioeconomic (sustainable revenues) in each part of the management of urban spaces that adapt to the real needs of people in urban development.