“Tabula Rasa” planning: creative destruction and building a new urban identity in Tehran

Abstract

The concept of Tabula Rasa, as a desire for sweeping renewal and creating a potential site for the construction of utopian dreams is presupposition of Modern Architecture. Starting from the middle of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century, Iranian urban and architectural history has been integrated with modernization, and western-influenced modernity. The case of Tehran as the Middle Eastern political capital is the main scene for the manifestation of modernity within it’s urban projects that was associated with several changes to the social, political and spatial structure of the city. In this regard, the strategy of Tabula Rasa as a utopian blank slate upon which a new Iran could be conceived “over again” – was the dominant strategy of modernization during First Pahlavi era (1925–1941). This article explores the very concept of constructing a new image of Tehran through the processes of autocratic modernism and orientalist historicism that also influenced the discourse of national identity during First Pahlavi era.

Keywords:

• destructive character
• modern urbanism
• Tabula Rasa planning
• First Pahlavi era
• Tehran

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Asma Mehan

ASMA MEHAN is a visiting PhD Student at EPFL (École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne) in Lausanne (Switzerland), Former Research Fellow at the Alfred Deakin Institute (ADI) in Deakin University, Melbourne (Australia) and PhD Candidate in “Architecture-History-Project” Doctoral Program in the Department of Architecture and Design (DAD), Politecnico di Torino, Torino (Italy). A graduate of Art University of Isfahan (AUI) with Master degree in Architecture and Urban Studies, she examines the relationship between democracy and the (trans)formations of urban space in Iran. Focusing on public squares, she traces their socio-political transformations as well as their role in instigating social transformations through examples that span from the pre-modern times to the present. Her current research on Tehran goes beyond the symbolic capacities of architecture and focuses on the politics of space production. Asma has been working as an Architect and Lecturer since 2010. She has extensively presented her research at national and international conferences, and has received Awards, Grants and Fellowships included: Awarded Travel Grant for attending in International PhD Seminar “Comparing Habitats” supported by the “EPFL Habitat Research Center and the Laboratory of Urbanism (Lab-U, EPFL)”, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) (Lausanne, 2017), Graduate Scholar Award by Spaces & Flows: Seventh International Conference on Urban and ExtraUrban Studies, University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, 2016), 2015 Premi di Qualità (Quality Awards) by Scuola di Dottorato (Doctoral School), Politecnico di Torino (Torino, 2016), Society of Architectural Historians’ (SAH) Keeper’s Preservation Educational Fund Annual Conference Fellowship (Chicago-2015), and Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain (SAHGB) Graduate Student Research Forum Travel Grant (Edinburgh 2015).