Abstract

This paper aims to present Tehran Grand Bazaar as a critical form-place, or, as Kenneth Frampton describes, an “arriére-garde” (Frampton, 1983, P. 20). It attempts to form a plea for a debate on the persistency of Tehran Grand Bazaar through its present-day condition.

The bazaar is rooted in the Persian city. It later became an intrinsic part of the Islamic city and a basic part of its morphology. It has always played an intermediate role between residential, religious and governmental parts. The older bazaar is not simply an economic institution; rather it is an amalgam of different activities such as coffee shops, public baths, ‘Tekye's

Tekye is the gathering place for religious ceremonies.

, Caravanserai, strength houses, etc. However, slowly after the introduction of moderni sation to Tehran, the bazaar lost parts of its social activities and structure due to socio-economic transformations like the new transportation network in the city and country and massive immigration. To chase the modernisation process and changes in the city, Tehran Grand Bazaar expanded the scale of its influence from city level to the country and later regional level.

Tehran Grand Bazaar is a challenging piece of urban fabric to study the relationship cited behind the socio-economic and cultural forces within the city and the subsequent transformation of existing structure and its settlements.