Gorgan Architecture in the Years 1920–1941
The most visible expression of the inherent duality in Reza Shah's governance — his simultaneous desire to modernize the country's cities and his ambition to resurrect the glorious heritage of ancient Iran — can be found in the architecture of the first two decades of the twentieth century. Within this framework, in order that "the signs and traces... of ancient Iran... might be fused with the true principles of modern civilization, presenting a special civilization to the human community" (Pahlavi, 1305, p. 31), a particular Pahlavi architecture took shape drawing on two primary sources: first, European neoclassicism — the preferred architecture of grandiose autocrats like Hitler, Mussolini, and Reza Shah, which, with its orientation toward antiquity, blended with elements borrowed from Achaemenid and Sasanian architecture; and second, early modern architecture, which gradually gained currency through the designs of progressive European architects and Iranian architects trained abroad. This architecture aimed, on one hand, to provide the Pahlavi regime with historical and national legitimacy by recreating the splendor of ancient Achaemenid and Sasanian Iran within neoclassical forms, thereby presenting the Shah as a worthy successor to the great ancient kings; and, on the other hand, to give the country's cities a new face by erecting buildings with the characteristics of early modern architecture, thus demonstrating the modernism and reform-orientation of Pahlavi rule. The architects of the era fell into two groups as well. One group — predominantly Iranians trained abroad — produced neoclassical designs with an antiquarian bent; the other — mostly Europeans working in Iran at the time — championed the cause of modern architecture. Amidst all this, only two architects, both foreigners, combined in some of their works elements of post-Islamic Iranian architecture with modern designs: the Georgian Nikolai Markov, in projects such as Alborz High School, the Post Office building, and Qasr Prison in Tehran, and the faculty buildings of the Agricultural College in Karaj; and the Frenchman André Godard, in works such as the Iran Bastan Museum, the Iranshahr High School in Yazd, and the Hafez Mausoleum in Shiraz. The architecture of Gorgan during the years 1920–1941 must be examined within the framework of two categories: governmental buildings and residential buildings. In neither category is there any trace of antiquarianism; yet in all surviving examples of the architecture of those years — from the Pahlavi Palace to modest homes — all or several of the following shared characteristics can be observed: extroversion; two-story construction; symmetry in mass and facade; compact floor plan; cement-rendered facades with projecting dressed pilasters as external expression of the structural frame; projecting balconies, in most examples above the building entrance; pitched roof clad in tile in place of the local vernacular roofing material.
These characteristics first appeared in governmental buildings, and subsequently several of them — blended with vernacular features — gained currency in residential construction as well. The use of these characteristics became so pervasive during the reign of the first Pahlavi that even the Agha Mohammad Khan Palace — the first Qajar palace and the only surviving building from the Qajar citadel of Astarabad, which had become the office of the Pahlavi Estates Administration — was reworked, its facades renovated and rebuilt with extensive alterations (Figure 1). Within this framework, in order to give the Qajar building a neoclassical appearance: elements of post-Islamic Iranian architecture, such as the pointed arches above the main entrance and the semicircular arches above windows and doors, were linearized; a pitched roof replaced the tiled roof; larger openings were substituted for the original doors and windows; the module-based proportional system of the palace's original architectural design — particularly on the facades — was disrupted; and the building acquired a different modulation and appearance through the addition of projecting pilasters to its facades. The upper portions of the projecting facade pilasters, beneath the overhanging roof cornice, were decorated with elaborate plasterwork capitals (Figure 2).
Governmental Buildings in the City. The governmental buildings surviving from the architecture of Gorgan in the years 1920–1941 encompass the following types: palaces; guest houses; schools; administrative buildings of government agencies (municipality, police, post and telegraph, Bank Melli, justice, etc.); hospital; service buildings around the municipality roundabout; commercial buildings; factory. Before examining the architectural designs of these buildings, however, it is necessary to address a particular base architectural pattern that was employed as a stylistic characteristic by a number of architects in buildings with very different functions.
The Base Architectural Pattern. The base architectural pattern — which has its roots in European neoclassicism and appears to have been first employed by Markov in the design of the Tehran Municipality building (1923–24) — is a simple linear architectural plan with a central core and two extended wings on either side. The central core houses the building's entrance hall, other common spaces, and the circulation connecting the two side wings; and, in two-story or multi-story buildings, the staircase providing access to the upper floor(s). The central core, positioned on the building's axis of symmetry, projects forward of the wing facades in plan; and in mass and elevation, it rises taller than the two flanking wings. The wings on either side of the central core house the building's numerous identical rooms and spaces, along with the corridors providing access to them. This pattern functions optimally in buildings with a significant number of identical rooms — hence its widest application is in school buildings, administrative offices, hospitals, and hotels. The base architectural pattern, when examined in examples from buildings constructed in the years 1920–1941 and subsequently, appears in several variants. In many buildings — such as Shah Reza High School in Mashhad, designed by Karim Taherzadeh Behzad (1931–32), where the pattern is employed in its initial form — to achieve a more architecturally developed result, the two free ends of the side wings are closed with projecting corner pavilions, creating a variant I have named the "eared" (gooshvareh-i) form. In others — such as the Gorgan Normal School (daneshsara-ye moqaddamati) — the elongation of the central core and its one-directional projection creates a T-shaped building mass. In more advanced variants of the pattern, a 90-degree turn at the midpoint of the two side wings — as an architectural technique for avoiding excessively long wings — transforms the building mass into a U-shape. This is seen in the Iranshahr High School in Yazd, designed by André Godard (1934). If the U-shape is combined with an elongated, one-directional projection of the central core, the building mass takes on an E-shape — as in the Tehran Police Headquarters (1932–37) by Qolich Baghliani, and the Pahlavi Hospital in Gorgan. A rare variant of the base pattern with bent wings can be seen in buildings on two-faced corner sites of urban roundabouts. In the bent-wing variant, the building's long axis breaks at the point where the side wings meet the central core in order to align with the two streets that define the building's edges. The Tabriz Municipality building (1935–39), whose design has been called "an eagle in flight," is an example of this variant: the side wings, with a 45-degree turn from the central core axis, align with the streets flanking the building's sides, which face the square. The Gorgan Government Guest House (Hotel Miami) is another example of the base architectural pattern with bent wings.
The Pahlavi Palace in Agha Mohammad Khan's time (Qajar era), photographed by Abdollah Mirza Qajar, Golestan Palace Album.
Government guest house at the municipality roundabout (Figure 5).
Government guest house (Hotel Miami) in the 1950s; photograph from the archive of Mahmoud Akhavan Mahdavi (Figure 6).
Hotel Miami in the 1970s; photograph from the archive of Mahmoud Akhavan Mahdavi (Figure 8). Variant forms of the base architectural pattern in the educational buildings of Gorgan (Figure 9).
Gorgan Municipality Building; photograph from the archive of Mahmoud Akhavan Mahdavi (Figure 11). A performance by Mohammad Reza Lotfi (tar player) in the Iranshahr High School auditorium (Figure 10). Gorgan Police Headquarters (Figure 12).
Government guest house and Shirsengi Passage (Figure 7).
The Pahlavi Palace, current appearance (April 2015) (Figure 4).
A section of the altered facade of the Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar Palace (Figure 2); photograph from the Cultural Heritage dossier. Facade of the Pahlavi Palace in the 1970s (Figure 3); photograph from the Cultural Heritage dossier.
The side wings of the building house the rooms and comparable spaces of the building in a double-loaded corridor arrangement with access corridors. The central core — positioned on the building's axis of symmetry — projects forward of the wing facades in plan; and in mass and elevation it rises taller and more prominently than the two flanking wings. The wings on either side of the central core house the building's numerous identical rooms and spaces, along with corridors providing access to them. This pattern functions optimally in buildings with a significant number of identical rooms; hence its widest application is seen in educational, administrative, and hospital buildings, and hotels. When we return to the examples of the base pattern in buildings constructed during the years 1920–1941, and afterward, it appears in several variants. In many buildings — such as Shah Reza High School in Mashhad, designed by Karim Taherzadeh Behzad (1931–32), where the pattern is used in its original form — the two free ends of the side wings are closed with projecting corner pavilions to achieve a more architecturally refined result, creating a variant I have named the "eared" (gooshvareh-i) form. In others — such as the Gorgan Normal School — with greater elongation of the central core and its one-directional projection, the building mass takes on a T-shape. In more advanced variants of the pattern, a 90-degree turn in the middle of the side wings — as an architectural device for avoiding excessively long wings — transforms the building mass into a U-shape. An example of this appears in the Iranshahr High School in Yazd, designed by André Godard (1934). If the U-shape is combined with an elongated, one-directional projection of the central core, the building mass takes on an E-shape — as in the Tehran Police Headquarters by Qolich Baghliani (1932–37), and the Pahlavi Hospital in Gorgan. A rare variant of the base pattern with bent wings is seen in buildings on two-faced corner sites of urban roundabouts. In the bent-wing variant, the building's long axis breaks at the point where the side wings join the central core in order to align with the two streets forming the building's edges. The Tabriz Municipality building (1935–39), whose design was called "an eagle in flight," is an example: the side wings, with a 45-degree turn from the central-core axis, align with the streets on either side of the building, facing the square. The Gorgan Government Guest House (Hotel Miami) is another example of the base architectural pattern with bent wings.
The Pahlavi Palace. The palace in Gorgan is one of approximately fifteen built during the first Pahlavi era in the northern cities of the country, and one of three Pahlavi palaces in the Gorgan region. The other two were the palaces of Kordkuy and Gonbad-e Kavus, which were transferred to the Ministry of Health for use as hospitals following the successive devastating earthquakes of 1944 (Ettelaat newspaper, issues 5836 and 5864). The Pahlavi Palace stands within the grounds of the city's National Garden, but no records survive of the dates of its construction. According to reports in Ettelaat newspaper, during 1928–37 Reza Shah traveled once a year to the Gorgan region (Gomush Tepe, Aq Qala, and Bandar Shah) in October or November to attend horse racing ceremonies. The annual horse races grew to such significance that in 1937 a special enclosure was built for the Shah and his entourage at the Bandar Shah racecourse. From these reports it can be inferred that construction of the Gorgan Palace began in late 1935 or early 1936 and was completed by the end of 1937. The identity of its architect is unknown (Figure 3). The Gorgan Palace was added to the national heritage list in February 1978, and its current use is as a museum. According to the building's heritage registration file, its facade is in the European style and the total built area of its two floors is 250 square meters. The palace building has been restored several times, but its original form has been preserved. The Gorgan Palace is a building of neoclassical architecture: its symmetrical mass and facades; entrances positioned on the building's axis of symmetry; the use of uniform windows to achieve orderly, embellished facades at the cost of ignoring the varying dimensions and functions of the different interior rooms and spaces; the projecting half-round dressed pilasters with ornate capitals, doubled at the corners; and a modular grid which, while giving the facades an ordered appearance, is at least on the two side facades purely cosmetic and structurally independent — these are among the neoclassical architectural details and characteristics visible on its exterior. It appears that the main entrance of the building was designed with a glance toward the main entrance of the Agha Mohammad Khan Palace. There, two tall round wooden columns on either side of the main entrance — reaching the roof structure via muqarnas capitals — function as an architectural device to make the entrance as conspicuous as possible in the building's external appearance. Here too, two tall columns flanking the entrance serve the same purpose. But there are two differences: first, the two columns flanking the entrance of the Agha Mohammad Khan Palace are, at least from a structural standpoint, true load-bearing elements for the roof structure, and are therefore positioned in line with the internal load-bearing walls and within the outer wall envelope. In the Pahlavi Palace, however, the roof projection above the main entrance — itself another device for emphasizing the building's entrance — is so slight that it could hardly require such massive columns. The two columns in question therefore serve a decorative-cum-trompe-l'oeil function, erected outside the building's structural shell. The other difference between the columns of the two palaces lies in the ornamentation of their capitals. In the Agha Mohammad Khan Palace, the capitals are adorned with Iranian muqarnas work, recalling in particular the decorative arts of the Safavid palaces of Isfahan. The plasterwork capitals of the Pahlavi Palace, for all the regime's claims about ancient Iran, are neither antiquarian nor Iranian — they are straightforward imitations of European neoclassical decorative conventions: a retrograde approach for the construction of a fictitious and false grandeur. It is worth noting that the same ornamentation was employed in the alteration of the facades of the Agha Mohammad Khan Palace, and in the construction and decoration of the pseudo-capitals atop the added projecting pilasters. An examination of the floor plans of the two stories of the palace reveals that the internal organization and spatial arrangement of the rooms of the Pahlavi Palace was also carried out with a neoclassical approach, based on a compact and symmetrical design. The palace is a rectangular building with a two-to-three ratio of dimensions, whose short axis — running north-south — constitutes its axis of symmetry. The recessed southern entrance of the palace in the central bay of the building projects outward at the northern edge from the rectangular shell and gives the northern facade a stepped appearance (Figure 4).
The Government Guest House (Hotel Miami). The guest house (Hotel Miami) was sited in the southeastern quadrant of the municipality roundabout; construction began in 1938. From the intersection of Palace Street and Shahrud Street, a sharp 62-degree angle was created at the southeastern corner of the municipality roundabout — and this became the framework for the architectural design of the government guest house (Hotel Miami). The architectural design of the guest house building is based on the base architectural pattern with bent wings. The bisecting line of the aforementioned corner constitutes the axis of symmetry of the building, and the side wings — with a 62-degree turn — pivot around the central core in order to align with the edges of the streets on either side of the site. The two side wings of the building are two stories high but of unequal length. In the middle of the shorter wing facing Shahrud Street is a stair tower, whose symmetrical counterpart also appears in the wing facing Palace Street. Both stair towers rise to the level of the third-story roof; enclosed by projecting vertical frames, they separate the three-story and symmetrical central portion of the building mass from the two-story sections of the side wings (Figure 5). The guest house building is an example of German Expressionist architecture from the interwar period, and the only three-story building in Gorgan during the years 1920–1941. Its central section rises a full story above all surrounding buildings at the municipality roundabout. Within this framework — in order to achieve a coherent urban skyline and avoid disruption of the roofline along Palace Street and Shahrud Street — the third story of the building on the side wings (facing the aforementioned streets) is set back half a bay from the edge of the two lower floors and designed as two continuous full-length balconies. This architectural device produces two valuable visual results (Figure 6). First, the vertical elements designed in the facades and mass of the building — the wall face containing the main entrance and the stair towers in the side wings, which rise to the height of all three floors — gain even more prominence and visual impact. The two-story continuation of each side wing beyond the stair towers works in the same direction. Second, if the setback of the third-floor edges is added to the 4.5–5-meter setback of the building mass from the edges of Palace Street and Shahrud Street, the building appears to be only two stories to observers at street level. Beyond the aforementioned characteristics, the central section of the guest house's facade facing the roundabout merits closer scrutiny. A single frame, three bays wide and three stories tall, which projects slightly forward of the facade plane, separates this section from the sections flanking it on either side. The recessed edge of the third story on either side of this frame doubles its prominence. In this way, the framed section of the facade — unlike the set-back wings on either side, positioned precisely at the edge of the roundabout — is entirely at odds with the uniform two-story facades of the surrounding buildings, particularly those on the northern half of the roundabout. And so it truly is. But the consequence of this incompatibility is that the guest house's facade facing the roundabout — and particularly its central section — has been placed at the visual focal point of the square. The eye of the viewer, the moment it enters the roundabout, is drawn irresistibly toward it. The tall, elongated entrance portal set within the vertical frame, positioned on the building's axis of symmetry, is one of the most frequently used elements in the architecture of the years 1920–1941. Two further examples can be found in two other buildings on the municipality roundabout — the municipality building and Bank Melli. The use of this element in the guest house building, with that height and grandeur, goes beyond mere visual harmony and architectural dialogue between the guest house and the two named buildings to place it at the visual focal point of the municipality roundabout.
After 1946, the hotel function of the guest house diminished significantly and portions of the building were transferred to other uses. The Department of Endowments, Education, and Arts (later Education and Training) occupied the wing facing Palace Street from 1947. Cinema Diana, the first cinema in Gorgan, was located in the two-story eastern end of the wing facing Shahrud Street during the 1950s. In the early 1960s the land was divided in two: the guest house's 8,000-square-meter site was reduced to 3,400 square meters. The southeastern portion of the guest house's land was sold in several separate parcels to private owners. On the larger of the separated plots — abutting the eastern and southeastern edges of the guest house land — the Shirsengi Passage was constructed (Figure 7). Of the two remaining parcels, the northern one, fronting Shahrud Street, was transferred to the Electricity Board. On the southern parcel, wall-to-wall with the Finance Department and fronting Palace Street, a new Cinema Diana building — later Cinema Empire — was constructed. Following these changes and the sale of the guest house to private owners, it was renamed Hotel Miami. A row of shops was also built in the two narrow strips remaining from the original building's setback from Palace Street and Shahrud Street. With this construction, the facade of the side wings at ground-floor level on Palace Street and Shahrud Street was completely blocked (Figure 8).
Government Schools. Examples of the base architectural pattern are most abundantly seen in school buildings. This phenomenon resulted from the Ministry of Education's use of standardized architectural designs drawn up for the rapid construction and opening of schools. For the preparation of these designs, the prominent architect of the era, Nikolai Markov, was engaged (Ettelaat newspaper, issue 615). Roland Dubrul, a French architect, was another who drew up standardized designs for schools (Ettehadieh, 1379). The base architectural pattern — with its characteristics of simplicity of plan, easy access from the central core to the various parts of the building, direct connection between interior rooms and spaces, harmony and consistency of the building's massing and facades, and economy and ease of construction — was considered an ideal pattern for school buildings, and its use in educational building designs was prevalent until the late 1960s. Within this framework, an examination of the educational buildings constructed in Gorgan and the region during the years 1920–1970 — such as Kordkuy Military Elementary School — reveals that the architectural designs of many of them are based on various forms of the base architectural pattern. In the architectural design of Gorgan's Iranshahr High School, after the addition of an auditorium building, the base architectural pattern with bent wings is clearly visible. In most of the schools built in the city after 1941 — from elementary to high school and college level — the base architectural pattern has been applied in its simplest form. Only in the architectural designs of two schools in the southeastern neighborhoods of Goruhban Mahalle and Villa Quarter was the base pattern in its "eared" form the basis of the building's design (Figure 9).
Iranshahr High School. Simultaneously with new construction for government agencies, a program was drawn up to build a dedicated building for Iranshahr High School in the Abbas Khani Garden. Construction of the school building, based on designs by German architects, began in the spring of 1936. Ahmad Shamlou spent his second year of high school at this school in 1939. Mohammad Reza Lotfi gave his first performance in this auditorium (Figure 10). The large auditorium — construction of which began in 1940 (Amuzesh va Parvaresh monthly, issues 10 and 11, p. 41) — served for many years as the only venue for theatrical and musical performances in Gorgan. In later years the large eastern portion of the school's very spacious courtyard was separated from it, and venues such as a gymnasium, Education Department administrative buildings, and another educational facility were constructed within it (Rajaei, 1386, pp. 11–13).
The Municipality and Police Headquarters Buildings. Roland Marcel Dubrul arrived in Iran in the second decade of the first Pahlavi era. During 1935–42 he worked in Tehran and held a particular place in shaping Reza Shah-era modernism. The architectural designs of many governmental buildings constructed in Tehran and several other cities during the years 1920–1941 were his work — including the municipality building and police headquarters in Gorgan (Ettehadieh, 1379). The municipality building, in the southwestern section of Pahlavi Square near the mouth of Palace Street, was constructed from 1930 onward, after having been designated "the newly established Municipal Office" location (Ettelaat, issue 1083). The municipality building is an elongated two-story rectangle with small projections at its lateral and rear edges extending beyond the rectangular shell. The building's elongation and main facade, along the long axis of the rectangle, faces the square without following the curvature of its edge. The symmetrical organization of the building mass and its roundabout-facing facade rests on the short axis of the rectangle. A tall vertical frame — slightly projecting from the facade plane, its upper edge touching the underside of the overhanging roof cornice — encloses the main entrance and the balcony window above it on the building's axis of symmetry. In addition to this frame, in order to make the main entrance even more prominent, the central section of the parapet at the roof edge — above the entrance frame and equal in width to it — has been formed into a tall semicircular pediment (Figure 11). The semicircular pediment was one of the most widely used elements in late Qajar architecture; it was the primary motif of building facades before the triangular classical pediment (sentry) derived from European neoclassicism supplanted it. The use of the semicircular pediment in the municipality building — and the flat, recumbent form of the same element above the courtyard-facing entrance of the main police building by Dubrul — since it does not appear in his other works, represents in my view a kind of architectural return to Qajar architecture on his part. This approach is meaningful in that it appears in two governmental buildings in the city of Gorgan — the home of the Qajar dynasty and birthplace of its founder. Another notable characteristic of the municipality building's main facade is its two-tiered symmetry. Beyond the overall symmetry based on the short axis of the building, the two halves of the facade on either side of the main entrance are also symmetrically organized. In each of the two halves, five windows set in a flat frame on the ground floor, together with three tall elongated central windows, two shorter windows on either side, and the detailing above and below the windows on the upper floor, compose a symmetrical arrangement based on the central window's axis in both floors of the building. Following the 1944 earthquake, the municipality building underwent several modifications and alterations. Some of these changes to the facade are revealed by comparison of the 1942 photograph with one taken after the reconstruction — presumably in the early 1950s. The most striking of these changes is visible at the roof edges. In the original construction, the upper portion of the facade walls was designed as a parapet above the continuous overhanging roof cornice, behind which the pitched roof was concealed. In the rebuilt structure, however, the pitched roof — like a single unified covering with edges projecting further than the facade walls — has been set atop the building. The police headquarters — Dubrul's other work in Gorgan — was sited on the western edge of Palace Street, adjacent to the eastern edge of the Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar Palace. The police facilities, on a 55-by-85-meter rectangular site with the long side running parallel to Palace Street, include an administrative headquarters building and a prison (Figure 12). The prison building, T-shaped and symmetrical in form, is sited in the interior of the lot. The main administrative building, however, is an elongated two-story rectangle, its long axis running parallel to and positioned along the street frontage. The same architectural language and elements used in the municipality building can be seen here as well. The recessed main entrance, with two round columns and neoclassical capitals on either side, positioned on the building's axis of symmetry; the continuous water-shedding cornice around the building and the pitched roof hidden behind the parapet at the roof edge; and the use of the semicircular pediment above the municipality building's entrance, here in a flat and horizontal form above the entrance of the police building in its courtyard-facing facade — these are among the architectural similarities between the two buildings (Figure 13).
The Post and Telegraph Building. The post and telegraph building was located in the central section of the western edge of Palace Street. Simultaneously with the construction of the municipality and police buildings, the Gorgan post and telegraph building was also under construction by the General Construction Department (Ettelaat, issue 2916). Although there is no record of Dubrul's authorship in the building's known works (Figure 14). The post office occupies a 35-by-55-meter rectangular lot fronting Palace Street. The symmetrical plan of the post office, sited 10 meters back from the street frontage, is also rectangular with two rounded corner projections added to the corners of its street-facing edge, making the building appear wider than it is. The most striking architectural feature of the post office is its main entrance on the axis of symmetry of the street-facing facade: a recession of nearly 45 percent of the facade's width at its center, with four round neoclassical columns rising the full height of the two-story building, which subdivide the entrance into five equal bays (Figure 15).
Bank Melli Building. Kiqbad Zafar Bakhtiar, a graduate of the Royal College of Art in England, designed Bank Melli buildings for several cities including Gorgan and Abadan (Architect, issues 2 and 3, pp. 102–103). The basis of his architectural design is the tracing of the circular curvature of the municipality roundabout through the entire symmetrical mass of the bank building — from the main facade facing the roundabout to the last rear wall. The reflection of the symmetrical curvature of the building mass is clearly visible in the bank's main street-facing facade. The building's entrance — enclosed by a vertical frame projecting higher than the roof edge — is the axis of symmetry of the building and is flanked by the two identical and simple, unadorned halves of the bank's facade. Two rows of windows set in flat elongated frames on either side of the entrance at ground floor level — similar to the flat ground-floor frames of the municipality building — are also an effort to maximize visual harmony between the two buildings in Gorgan. Among the buildings constructed in Gorgan during 1920–1941, Bank Melli is the only one that presents a comprehensive and unqualified example of the progressive modern architecture of those years. Zafar Bakhtiar's design — utterly free of any tendency toward neoclassicism — takes such a pure and forward-looking approach to modern architecture that it transcends even the early modern architecture and German Expressionism that dominated the period. It is within this framework that Bank Melli is the only governmental building — and perhaps the only building in first Pahlavi Gorgan — whose roof has no overhanging cornice above the facade and is not pitched (Figures 16 and 17).
Meskots (Meskovich) and the Design of the Pahlavi Hospital. The Pahlavi Hospital, 350 meters west of Palace Circle on Shahpur Street — which was also called the Health and Hospital Street, and in later years Farmandari Street and colloquially Moulin Rouge Street — was the first government hospital built in Gorgan. In June 1939 a major fire damaged the hospital building (Ettelaat, issue 3846). Together with the reconstruction of the damaged building in 1939, a plan was drawn up to add a clinic to the hospital (Ettelaat, issue 4123). Regarding the architectural design of the Pahlavi Hospital, on the basis of several Ettelaat newspaper reports, it can be surmised that the work of an architect named Emil Meskots or Meskovich. The architectural design of the Pahlavi Hospital — as a blend of neoclassical and early modern architectural characteristics — is based on a somewhat modified form of the E-variant of the base architectural pattern for governmental buildings. Here the side wings extend beyond a 90-degree fold to twice the length of the central core; so much so that the architectural design of the building mass combines both the T- and E-shaped variants into one form.
Commercial and service buildings around the municipality roundabout, decorative facade details (Figures 22 and 23).
Finance Department building in the 1960s; photograph from the archive of Mahmoud Akhavan Mahdavi (Figure 20).
Post and telegraph building, main facade; photograph from the archive of Mahmoud Akhavan Mahdavi (Figure 15).
Bank Melli building in its original built form; photograph from Architect journal, issue 2 (Figure 16).
Municipality Square in the 1960s, aerial view; photograph from the archive of Mahmoud Akhavan Mahdavi (Figure 21).
Justice Department building, architectural plan; slightly modified from Kiani, 1393, p. 382 (Figure 18).
Bank Melli and Municipality buildings at the southern edge of the municipality roundabout; photograph from the archive of Mahmoud Akhavan Mahdavi (Figure 17).
The lot of the hospital is a 150-by-150-meter square on the south side of Farmandari Street. The hospital building — following the shape of its lot and aligning with the street edge — was designed and built with its axis running in a southeast direction. Within this framework, the building's axis of symmetry, perpendicular to Farmandari Street, is rotated approximately 19 degrees to the southeast. Another notable characteristic of the hospital building — perhaps more remarkable than all others — is the inverted use of the base pattern in its architectural design. Within this framework, the face containing the building's entrance — which constitutes the main facade and in all designs is oriented toward public urban spaces (a square or street) — here faces the southern courtyard of the building. In contrast, the free ends of the folded halves of the two side wings and the free end of the elongated central core have been designed as the main street-facing facade, housing the main entrance.
The Justice Department Building. The courthouse and land registration building is sited on the north side of Shahrud Street, 150 meters east of the municipality roundabout. The justice department building occupies a trapezoidal lot measuring on average 90-by-70 meters, positioned on the north side of Shahrud Street. The largest edge of the lot — running parallel to Shahrud Street and 100 meters long — faces the street. The base architectural pattern in its "eared" variant, with slight modifications, was the basis of the architectural design here as well. In this instance, the two side wings — with a corridor in the middle and two rows of rooms on either side — are shorter than in other examples. The corner "ears" at the ends of the side wings are also more elongated, taking the form of 90-degree two-directional folds extending to both north and south. The southward-folded branches of each wing extend all the way to the street edge. The northward branches are of unequal length — the western branch longer than the eastern — disrupting the building's plan symmetry. From the street, however, the building appears entirely symmetrical (Figure 18). The building touches the street edge of Shahrud Street with the southern ends of its projecting "ears," and a small portion of its lot at the street frontage — enclosed on three other sides by the building's walls like a small courtyard — has been converted into a forecourt for the main entrance. With this forecourt, the entrance facade of the building acquires greater prominence. On the northern edge of the forecourt is a full-length colonnaded portico with eight plain round columns at the edge of the floor slab, rising to the underside of the building's roof structure. The main entrance — in the middle of the portico and three bays wide, though slightly recessed from the facade plane — is positioned on the facade's axis of symmetry and leads into the building. The recessing of the main entrance from the facade plane is such that two more columns — rising from the ground floor to the underside of the upper-floor covering, flush with the building's facade wall and aligned with the two central columns of the portico edge — are positioned in front of it. Another notable feature of the building's facade is the projecting, molded cement frames around the windows — a sign of the neoclassical origins of the justice building's architecture. The central core of the building, with a width equal to that of the main entrance, houses a central colonnaded hall rising the height of the building's two floors. The height of the columns within this hall also runs, like those of the outer portico, from floor to roof structure. The staircase providing access to the upper floor and the northern entrance of the building, facing the rear courtyard, are located on the north side of the hall.
The Finance Department Building. The Finance Department, at the eastern edge of Palace Street 140–150 meters south of the municipality roundabout and immediately to the north of Iranshahr High School, occupies a 77-by-70-meter lot on the eastern edge of Palace Street. The main section of the building is an elongated two-story rectangle whose short axis — perpendicular to the street edge — is its axis of symmetry. At the northwestern corner of the building, a one-story section is attached. This section, visible in the aerial photograph from 1956, was in my view added in later years — possibly during the post-earthquake reconstruction of April 1944 — disrupting the building's symmetry (Figure 19). On the building's axis of symmetry, in the central section of the main street-facing facade — which is modulated by standing pilasters, slightly projecting and with molded decorative profiles — a tall, standing cylinder rising all the way to the underside of the roof structure houses the building's main entrance (Figure 20).
The Rice Mill Factory. The name of Rice Mill Street derived from a large rice mill factory 650 meters south of Palace Circle. The land and buildings of the factory stood until the mid-1960s, then were sold and in the early 1970s were cleared for private construction.
Service and Commercial Buildings Around the Municipality Roundabout. The commercial and service buildings of the northern half of the municipality roundabout — although belonging to no state or military organization — were constructed under government supervision and oversight, following a unified program and a single architectural template. Their construction began in the first half of 1930, simultaneously with the formation of the roundabout. The juxtaposition of this construction with the guest house (Hotel Miami) and municipality buildings on the southern half of the roundabout made the municipality roundabout the main new urban focal point of Gorgan. The result of following official circulars was the formation of a type of street architecture during the years 1920–1941 of which the service and commercial buildings of the northern half of the municipality roundabout are an archetypal example. The units composing this street architecture are two-story buildings with several commercial bays at ground level and service offices on the upper floor. The harmonious appearance of the buildings on the northern half of the municipality roundabout results from the application of an architectural vocabulary with the following characteristics: modulated facade; cement-rendered facade with projecting decorative pilasters and ornate pseudo-capitals as external expression of the structural frame; projecting balconies over the entrance portals; projecting, molded cement frames around openings; installation of uniform doors and windows. Examples of the architectural details of the above characteristics are shown in the photographs below (Figures 21, 22, 23).
Residential Buildings. The modernizing construction of the Reza Shah era to some extent laid the groundwork for private-sector renewal in Gorgan. On one hand, the governmental buildings familiarized residents with new architectural models and construction methods. On the other hand, the opening of streets created a context for renewal on street-fronting lots. In the years 1935–39, on a number of these lots — particularly along the eastern half of Pahlavi Street to the municipality roundabout — new commercial buildings were constructed following the architectural model of the buildings around the municipality roundabout (Ettelaat newspaper, issues 2552, 2584, 2925, 3809). Following the municipal circulars of March and April 1938, which required landowners along the street frontage to construct two-story buildings (Ettelaat, issues 304 Bamdadi, 3465), the Gorgan municipality also compelled landowners along Pahlavi-e-Dezh Street to obtain building designs from the municipality from early 1940. This approach continued until August 1941 (Ettelaat, issues 4352, 4402, 4437, 4580). Away from the frontages of newly opened streets — in the interior sections of the urban fabric — houses of several wealthy individuals (merchants, landowners, senior government officials) were built with an outward-facing architecture and with reference to the facade models of governmental buildings. The common characteristic of the buildings examined in this section is that their architectural designs were formed within frameworks distinct from the vernacular architecture of Astarabad. The particular architectural style that gained currency in the years after 1921 — which can be called first Pahlavi style — is one such framework. Most examples of this style appear in commercial and service buildings. Another foreign architectural style, derived from Russia and the Caucasus and to some extent from Europe, manifests itself in the design of pavilion-type buildings (kooshk). Alongside these, a third style must be mentioned — one that, by blending the characteristics of first Pahlavi architecture with aspects of vernacular architecture, was the most widely used style in house construction. Moreover, the years 1920–1941 were neither, as is often assumed, the beginning of the aforementioned styles nor their end — they were the signal of a slow and long-lasting process of rupture from vernacular architecture and the gaining of currency of foreign styles. The first signs of the infiltration of foreign architecture into Astarabad appeared in these very years. The construction of the first buildings in the first Pahlavi architectural style also began, from 1931 onward, simultaneously with the construction of the commercial and service buildings around the municipality roundabout. These buildings — like the first governmental examples of first Pahlavi architecture — presented a newly emergent architectural model whose facade-forming elements were employed not only in commercial and service buildings but also in houses.
Commercial and Service Buildings. On the 15-meter-wide former Pahlavi Street — from a few dozen meters west of the four-way crossroads at the square to the far eastern side of the municipality roundabout — was the main strip where street architecture developed in Gorgan. Today approximately 15 commercial and service buildings with the architectural characteristics of first Pahlavi style, built in the 15-to-20 years after 1931, still stand on this strip. The number of these buildings was undoubtedly greater at the outset, and the facade of several was renovated and altered in later years; but the significant number of single-story buildings on the northern edge of the street indicates that a continuous strip of street architecture with the two-story model envisioned by government officials never fully materialized. The architectural characteristics of street architecture from the years 1920–1941 — as applied in the commercial and service buildings around the municipality roundabout — are also visible in the facades of buildings still standing on the former Pahlavi Street. Among these, the facades of two buildings exhibit characteristics unlike those of other buildings on this strip. In the facade of the first building, no trace of projecting pilasters or ornate decorative detailing is visible. But its other facade characteristics (cement rendering, projecting frames around windows, a projecting balcony canopy over the pedestrian walkway above the building entrance) are the same as those of other buildings. This building appears to have been constructed after 1941. The second building, however, is the only building on the street strip that retains the architectural characteristics of Astarabad vernacular architecture. This building, in my view, is an old house whose surviving northern portion — after the street was opened — was rebuilt with the same vernacular architectural characteristics (Figures 24, 25, 26).
Residential Buildings (Houses). Extroversion is the most fundamental transformation in the architecture of Gorgan's residential buildings; in most houses built after 1921, the building occupies the street frontage in a conspicuous manner. Within this framework, the building facade occupies a special position. The architecture of extroversion in the years 1920–1941 is a domain that places the most visible characteristics of this architectural style before the eye. But first Pahlavi architecture had nothing more to display in the facades of residential buildings than what was visible in commercial and service building facades. For this reason, the facades of houses — with the same cement rendering and slightly projecting decorative pilasters, the same window frames set in projecting cement surrounds, the same ornate pseudo-capitals, and the same small projecting balconies over the lane or street pavement, but in various designs — can be seen in all surviving examples from those years (Figures 27 and 28). The window — in a different shape and size, together with the other elements employed in the architecture of 1920–1941 — gave a distinctive appearance to house buildings. With the installation of three- or four-leaf windows of roughly equal width and height — at the level of the threesome or foursome windows of vernacular houses, higher than the floor level of the rooms, in place of the more traditionally open-walled construction — a larger portion of the building surface was built with solid, closed walls, and the open and semi-open facades of vernacular architecture were transformed into closed facades (Figure 29). Among these elements, the symmetrical organization of facades — arising from the symmetry of the floor plan and mass — must be noted; it presents the extroversion of the architecture of the years 1920–1941 and its facade-forming elements with even greater clarity and doubled visual impact (Figure 30). The small round window is another newly emergent element visible in the facades of many houses built during the years 1920–1941. These windows — installed mostly in the small service and utility rooms of houses — are undoubtedly modeled on similar windows in the facades of the municipality and post office buildings.
The floor plan of the house in the architecture of the years 1920–1941 — based on an examination of surviving examples — indicates that this architecture remained largely confined to the exterior of buildings, unable to penetrate to the interior organization of the house. Each house built in those years, when viewed from the outside, presents a clear expression of the contemporary architectural style. Inside the house, however, a symmetric linear plan unfolds, recalling the plan of vernacular houses — with a staircase in the middle and rooms on either side on both the ground and upper floors. In most examples, the rooms of the ground floor have windows only in the sun-facing wall; the rooms of the upper floor, with windows in two opposite walls, are similar to the ventilated rooms of vernacular architecture. The only transformation in the house plan is internal access to rooms and spaces from within the building. No trace remains of the external platforms and projecting entrance porches (pishkan) of vernacular houses. The interior is separated from the exterior by the building entrance. The staircase providing access to the upper floor is also inside the building. In this context, the placement of the house entrance is also a phenomenon worth examining. In none of the surviving examples from those years does the house entrance open directly from the lane into the building. In all examples, the house entrance opens from the lane into a courtyard, and the route into the building is through the courtyard. Thus — within the framework of the characteristics enumerated — the house built in the years 1920–1941, as representative of this architectural style in Gorgan's residential buildings, is essentially a blend of Astarabad's vernacular architectural plan with the facade known as the first Pahlavi style. Accomplished examples of these characteristics can be seen in a house in the north of the Nalbandan Quarter (Figure 31). This two-story house occupies the northern edge of a roughly 250-square-meter rectangular lot and fronts the lane. A narrow open strip on the eastern edge of the house lot leads from the lane to the courtyard, and the route into the building is through the courtyard. The symmetric linear plan of the house — reminiscent of the simple, linear, and elongated plans of vernacular architecture — includes the building entrance hallway and the upper-floor access staircase on the plan's axis of symmetry, and rooms on either side of the staircase. In the north wall (the lane-facing facade) of the ground-floor rooms, the small round windows mentioned earlier have been installed. But the upper-floor rooms have large four-leaf windows (facing north and south) and three-leaf windows on all three outer walls. The symmetrical plan of the house is reflected in the building's mass and facades in a remarkable way. Yet no facade is a mirror image of the facade opposite; each of the four facades has its own internal symmetry. In the southern facade, the building's structural frame is expressed as four standing, molded, slightly projecting pilasters — rising from the base of the building to the underside of the roof — dividing the facade. The eastern half of this facade on the upper floor has one large four-leaf window and one tall two-leaf French door-window with a railing. The western half of this facade on the upper floor has no windows; and to preserve the symmetry of the facade, a cement frame — identical to the frame around the window on the eastern half, but solid — has been applied to the wall of the western half as a counterbalance. The technique of applying solid cement frames to walls is also used on the western and northern facades of the building. Here, however, its function is to eliminate the starkness and monotony of the solid, closed wall in the building's facade. The northern facade lacks the two middle pilasters of the southern facade. In their place, on either side of the tall window that opens onto the small balcony facing the lane, two round projecting molded frames have been applied. These two symmetrical round frames — together with the two round windows of the ground floor and the projecting balcony on the building's axis of symmetry — give the lane-facing facade its distinctive character (Figure 32).
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A house in the north of Nalbandan Quarter, partial view of the northern facade (Figure 32).