Hotel as a Node in Tourism Network

Hotel is a French word referring to the western, standardized complex of buildings and services to shelter and accommodate traveling individuals, families, and groups. At lower standards, there has been, and still is, a wide range of tourist facilities to provide shelter and food to the travelers over the world, most of them designed and operated commercially to meet the needs of various classes of tourists.

These include but are not limited to the regular travel lodges, motels, low-income board and rooms, and rent-a-room in private residences, highway-oriented rest areas, Japanese-style Yokos, restaurants and tea houses which also provide limited shelter to the travelers. In addition, subsidized accommodations of various types are built and operated by non-profit, charity, and religious organizations all over the world in order to provide shelter and food to pilgrims, students, wayfarers, and low-income travelers.

This article focuses on two types of accommodations, namely hotel and motel, whose design and construction require careful planning and feasibility study, assuming that other types of above-mentioned facilities are built and operated in a much less formal way and with the needs and purchasing power of the users in mind.

Iran has experienced international-style hotels since the 1960s. Hilton and Sheraton chain of 5-star hotels opened their branch in Iran in that decade, and experienced their business peak during the 1970s. Iranians followed that initial move by building their own chain of first-class hotels in major cities, and set up educational facilities to train hotel managers and staff. However, due to the Islamic revolution and emergence of conflict with the West, the country lost much of its share of European and American tourism market to competing countries, especially Turkey and the Emirates of the Persian Gulf.

This loss was partially compensated by increase in the volume of internal tourism, particularly by the rise of pilgrimages to the holy shrine of Mashhad, Qom, and Shiraz. Finding specifications of space and facilities for hotels are not difficult. Hotel and motel designers can readily locate standards for design and construction in regular architectural books such as Time-Saver Standards for Building Types. What might be difficult is integration of Iranian architectural principles with modern standards of hotel design and construction. This is where ingenuity and knowledge of the western and Iranian architectural history will be the biggest asset of a hotel designer.

Spatial Position of Various Hotels in the Tourism Network

Understanding the spatial position of different types of accommodation within the broader tourism network is essential. Hotels positioned along pilgrimage routes serve fundamentally different functions than resort hotels or urban business hotels. Iranian hotel design must account for the specific cultural and religious needs of domestic travelers while maintaining international hospitality standards.

Space and Classification of Hotels

The classification system for hotels in Iran follows both international standards and local requirements. Designers must consider the unique demands of Iranian hospitality culture, including gender-segregated facilities, prayer rooms, and the integration of traditional architectural elements that create a sense of place and cultural identity within modern hotel frameworks.