Socio-spatial dialectic of bazaar and city: analysis of the Isfahan bazaar in line with the urban fabric transformation

A bazaar in the Persian city has root in history, geography, economy, culture, architecture and society’s values and considered as main pillars of the city. This phenomenon emerged as a well-formed in the Islamic era and was regarded as the backbone and main axis of Islamic cities both in terms of physical and social-cultural. The Persian bazaar with its unique features, first entered to the Islam world’s territory afterwards other parts of the world. In most historical cities of Iran, all the other collections are in close connection with the bazaar axis in terms of physical and social relationship and different public buildings such as mosques, schools, baths and urban caravanserais and also residential areas were formed along this axis. In this dissertation, bazaar is considered as the mainstream of the research and much of the literature review is to explain and provide a better understanding of bazaar and its structure is organized in interaction with the city, particularly in terms of socio-spatial interactions. All available resources on bazaar will be analyzed and a totality that is approved by all the resources achieve and by considering this totality, its relations with the city and their socio-spatial relationships with each other can be explained. Here Isfahan bazaar has been selected as the case study and is studied in line with the transformation of contemporary urban fabric and in response to its socio-spatial relationship with the city and interaction with it. Isfahan city is a good example of the most prevalent pattern for Old Iranian urbanism. Its bazaar is considered as the main skeleton and it is just in Isfahan, and nowhere else that bazaars play such an outstanding role in the development of the city. Among the traditional bazaars in cities of Iran, a bazaar in the scale of Isfahan bazaar is rare; this bazaar has retained its structure and remained intact. And yet, with all the modern transformations it is in understandable interaction with the structure of city and its socio-spatial relations are traceable. This thesis ultimately tries to analyze and explain the taking behavior by Isfahan bazaar against the transformation of Isfahan in contemporary periods, and also the influences of modern planning and comprehensive master plans of the city on Isfahan and its remaining structures from centuries.