Misadventure of decorative management in the World Heritage’s Persian gardens

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to present a general view of the current status of the agricultural landscapes in seven Persian gardens, which all have been registered by UNESCO as the World Heritage property (cultural landscape). The cases studies are Abbas Abad garden (Behshahr), Fin garden (Kashan), Akbariyeh garden (Birjand), Dolat Abad garden (Yazd), Pahlavanpour garden (Mehriz), Chehelsotun garden (Isfahan), and Shazadeh garden (Mahan).The findings of this study show there is not sufficient attention toward the conservation and restoration of productive greenery in Persian gardens. In Fin and Chehelsotun gardens the agricultural landscape has completely devastated and converted to the non-original decorative green spaces. In the same way, the visitors of Abbas Abad garden do not observe any productive areas in the garden periphery. On the other hand, the fruit-bearing greeneries in Akbariyeh, Shahzadeh, and Pahlavanpour gardens have been preserved. Nevertheless, the serious and pursuant actions should be taken for revitalizing the productive sceneries of these historical gardens. Finally, the agricultural lands of Dolat Abad garden have fortunately not yet been converted, but do not have the active and vivid condition. In conclusion, beyond conserving the architectural features of Persian gardens, it is also vital to be revived their agricultural landscapes. Finally, it should be mentioned that revitalization and rehabilitation the productive greeneries in historical gardens is a fundamental way to demonstrate the genuine Persian garden.