Traces of Karim Taher-zadeh Behzad’s Architecture in the History and Building of an Extant High School in Qazvin

Historical documents show that in the first decade of the fourteenth century AH, Karim Taher-zadeh Behzad, one of the most famous and prolific architects of the first generation of Iranian contemporary architecture, designed two schools in Qazvin, one of which was a boys’ high school. The historical course of the construction of an extant high school, part of which remains today in Qazvin’s Red Crescent Street, led the authors to believe that it is the "Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi High School." The present study attempts to test this hypothesis by studying historical documents and comparing the architectural style of Behzad’s built schools with the physical quality of the mentioned building. The purpose of this study is to introduce the high school in question as one of the contemporary architectural works in Qazvin and to investigate the probability of its design made by Karim Taher-zadeh Behzad. To this end, qualitative historical research is carried out using a descriptive-interpretive, historiographical, and architectural approach, based on the interpretive paradigm to develop comparative historiography of the high school building. The data collection method is field study and archive-library research. The results of this study which is compiled in two main sections (Introduction and Investigation) show that although successive physical changes were imposed on the building and distorted its authenticity, there is a temporal link between the schools designed by Taher-zadeh Behzad in Qazvin and the mentioned high school building. In addition, there is a significant relationship between the design patterns in Behzad’s schools with that of the mentioned high school. Based on this, the probability of Behzad being the architect of the high school becomes higher.