Assessing the Beauty of Darabad District in Tehran Based on Serial Vision

Townscapes can be perceived by human senses and the most important one is visual sense. Cullen as one of the well-known specialists, created the concept of ‘serial vision’, defining the townscape as a series of related spaces. Survey of Cullen`s essays and his followers (i.e. David Gosling, Peter Bosselmann) provides a base for this research, which presents a framework for assessing the quality of different visual character of a part of a city based on Gordon Cullen’s concept of townscape. This study presents a framework for visual townscape assessment, based on descriptive and pictorial analysis. The main objective of this research is to establish links between townscape aesthetics theory and the concept of “serial vision”. This will help to obtain practical principles in urban landscape design. The focus of the study is the gradual changes of landscapes through pedestrian motion and its relation to the aesthetic of space. The method is based on assessing some selected criteria and indicators which relate to the concepts of serial vision and aesthetics. The technique is provided by evaluation matrices. The case study is Darabad district in Tehran, which divided to 3 different zones: built landscape, mountainous area and the intermediate space between these two zones. The visual quality of each zone has evaluated separately and then a general analyzes is provided. The information necessary for the study is gathered by field observations and the pictures were taken from different zones of the site. The results indicate that the principles applied by Cullen in “Concise of Townscape” could be achieved via evaluation of townscape aesthetics criteria.