Comparative Study of the Role of Foreign Architects in Iran's and Turkey's Contemporary Architecture during 1920-79PB (1300-57SH)

In early twentieth century, political leaders of Turkey and Iran who noticed the backwardness of their country comparing to Western nations sought the solution in fast modernization through a western method. Development of construction methods, emerging functions and vast projects of construction in this era paved the way for the participation of Western experts and consultants of these countries. Presence of these architectures in Pahlavi era in Iran, contemporary with the years of the first Turkish republic until the 1980 Turkish coup d’état, caused modern period architecture in these countries to take distance from their historical background. This research attempts to explore the role of foreign architects and urban planners in the development of Iran’s and Turkey’s architecture, and the way they influence Iran’s and Turkey’s modern architecture through conducting a comparative study. Identifying the role of the architects in architectural developments and the way they are influenced by local and traditional architecture in Iran and Turkey have been questioned. Therefore, the research was conducted in two stages; first, through conducting a documentary study into modern architecture of Iran and Turkey, and then through performing a comparison between Iran and Turkey. The results of the research divided the role of foreign architects and city developers in the modern architectural developments of Iran and Turkey from 1920s to 1980s into two overall epochs, dealing with the comparison of the role of the architects in the two overall periods. According to the results of this study, the role of foreign architects and urbanists, whether in architectural education or in professional activities, was the same, while in the second period such similarity was not observed as it was influenced by domestic factors. Also the foreign architects in both countries have been influenced by the countries’ vernacular architecture.