Recognition of form and structure of Kashani Garden in Ravand

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Abstract

Until recent decades, many gardens have been designed and planned according to Iranian gardens’ style and in traditional structure. Many of these gardens are located in rural areas and around the cities of Iran. Therefore, recognition and studying the rural gardens in all around Iran take on considerable importance.
Recognizing and introducing Kashani garden as one of the Iranian rural khani gardens in Ravand region of Kashan, this paper aims at providing a clear picture of the spatially organized structural and physical spaces of this garden, thereby structural and spatial retrieval of the said garden could be provided. Moreover, it has been attempted to refer to the subject of the study and conduct field studies based on written sources and historical documents in order to obtain favorable result.
Having introduced and reviewed the spatial structure of Kashani garden, the main features of the rural Khani gardens are presented, and accordingly, given the said criteria, it has been attempted to compare Kashani garden with other rural Khani gardens scattered over the villages and around the urban areas. 
Although significant parts of the garden have been destroyed, it seems that the original structure of the garden could be retrieved using series of the remained documents.
Kashani garden, located in Ravand village, was owned by one of the local wealthy Khans (rulers). The major space of the garden consists of open area which possesses specified limits in a manner which could be easily distinguished from the surrounding areas. Moreover, There is an edifice inside the garden. Kahsani garden occupies a total area of more than 2.5 hectares with a slope of less than %1 which indicates the flat level of the garden location. The area of this garden is in the shape of parallelogram with a summerhouse in the back part which has provided an organized spatial structure.

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