Eclecticism, the subject of this paper, manifests when elements from different structural, spatial and decorative forms and styles, carrying features representing specific and distinct cultures combine in a single work, chiefly in architecture. The term ‘eclecticism’, however, in the mindset and literature of societies with ancient artistic heritage, is imbued with negative denotations. This is because “artistic styles” in such societies are often associated with “identity” and “originality”, both of whom designate a long progress in the passage of time, while eclecticism appears to lack such “valuable” process.

In the process of deliberating eclecticism a few questions seem fundamentally relevant: How can then we define “identity” and “style” in the art and architecture of younger societies? Is modern religious architecture “without identity” if it does not follow the traditional trend? To what degree can architects incorporate imported alien elements in designing of local religious buildings? And finally, can eclectic architecture reach the status of a proper “architectural style”?   

Eclecticism gained rapid momentum in the field of Malaysian mosque architecture during the past two decades. Significant eclectic mosques that have transformed the scene and skylines of major Malaysian cities have often been heavily financed by the government – an indication of conscious choice of direction. The subject is yet to be studied and deserves a systematic research. This paper aims to present an analytical study of the concept of ‘eclecticism’ and ‘identity’ in the context of Malaysian contemporary mosque architecture.

Using domes to cover large gaps has a long history in Iran. Lack of solid and long woods, which indeed are the main elements of the flat coverage, has introduced vaults and domes as the popular options for coverage purposes. In Iranian architecture, domes enjoy a considerable position. The Iranian Muslim architect has used his talent and taste, as best as possible, to build mosques, as not only structural considerations have been considered in his works, but also the aesthetic aspects of domes have been dealt with.

This study tries to analyze the gradual evolution of mosques' domes during different historical epochs by emphasizing the dimensional proportions of domes, as an aesthetic component. It also answers the question that is there any significant relationship between aesthetic components of domes during different historical eras and in a single geographical area? For this purpose, initially the available related literature was reviewed to compile typology styles and to elicit effective components in order to compare and classify domes. Limiting these studies to the Central Iranian Plateau helped us to control our study's range. Methods and documents used in this study were sections of domes of mosques and the mentioned geography regarding the bibliographical references. Achievements of this study were organized using descriptive-analytical methods, depicting scatter diagrams and analysis of statistical data. This study showed that the external deflection of mosques' dome has been increased by Mozzaffari-Teymurid, whereas it started to decrease during Safavid era. Unlike the external deflection, the internal proportions in mono-shell and double-shell domes had overlap with each other and there are not very different. At the same, the historical evolution of form of Iranian mosques' domes follows Khagi, Nar and shamrock domes.

Regarding to a special respect to humans and their living environment, the Harat school has used plethora of architectural elements. Architecture in the Harat school is an element spread in the space of miniature in order to arrange the structure and to create an appropriate position for the characters of miniature. In the present study development of architectural elements and their influence on the structure of the artworks has been investigated using an expression-analytic method. The effect of architectural elements have never been constant through the history starting with a bare facing of a building and improving gradually to an evolutionary state in miniatures of the Harat school which has converted to an alive and dynamic space affecting the entire structure of the composition as included in this study. The experimental species of the current study have been selected from the artworks of primitive and late eras of timured miniatures. A particular perspective thanks to the architectural elements along with frequently changing the point of view and simultaneous illustration of several spaces of a building are the main charachteristics of timured miniatures. Buildings demonstrated in timured miniatures include a vast spectrum from religious buildings such as mosques to civil ones like martial constructions and bathhouses.

Privacy is one of the basic principles of Islamic architecture. Islamic texts like Quran and Hadiths indicate that privacy is an important subject in the house which provides peace for the family. The houses that are built in Islamic era represent this principle, but unfortunately, this important architectural principle is nowadays ignored in houses. Therefore, reviewing the privacy principle in the traditional houses can help the architects recognize and apply it in houses. The entrance hierarchy, which is based on several factors such as religious, cultural, social, etc., is one of the elements to create the privacy in houses. It seems that this hierarchy in Bushehr’s houses is due to other factors that have not been investigated before. This article tries to discuss these points: the meaning of privacy hierarchy, reviewing the privacy hierarchy in the entrance of Bushehr historical houses, and its relation with the homeowner’s job. So in this article, the theory of hierarchy of privacy in Islam has been used by library resources, articles and internet sites and the traditional houses of Bushehr are studied by using interviews with experts, direct observation, and the documents that have remained from these houses. The results show that the occupation of Muslim home owners of Bushehr has influenced the entrance hierarchy in buildings. So the houses of important governmental people had the highest hierarchy privacy due to their relations with important people. Doctors and businessmen’s homes had a relatively high level of privacy due to their relations with customers and ordinary people. The homes of people with office jobs and normal social level had the lowest hierarchy privacy among the homes that were surveyed. Thus it can be said that, based on a Muslim owner’s job, the amount of privacy hierarchy had been different which are classified into three different types. The first type; the entrance was located at the corner of the house plan as of the businessmen and doctors’ houses. Due to a high number of visiting people, the entrance was designed with high privacy level and no direct visibility into the house. In some cases, for men’s trade affairs, there was a room whose entrance was located in the first vestibule of the house.The second type; the entrance of these houses was located on one side of the house plan. It opened to the courtyard with less hierarchy than the previous type. It just contained a corridor because few unfamiliar people visited these houses which belonged to the governmental office workers. The third type; these houses had two separate entrances and belonged to important people (such as consuls, mayors, sheriffs, etc.). The house and office of these people were combined in one complex. Because important governmental people visited these houses, two entrances were created to separate the private and public sections of the house.

In its conceptual meaning, Social Interaction, as a mean of connecting individuals in a society, is defined differently in the realm of Sociology. In this respect, the effective status of social interactions in the formation of proper social relations is shown in Architecture. The benefits of this status include cooperation to achieve active-public profit and its results, the development of participation, trust and cohesion in the society, and the improvement of relations between people and groups. Social interaction in western notion is bound to public places in the society, the reason why public places such as streets, recreation centers, and other urban architectures are paid a lot of attention. The definition of social interaction in western architecture is in line with an urban public place which has resulted in different attitudes in the formation and architecture of such places, compared to Islamic thought.

The principles of designing social interaction places in architecture apply to issues like the formation of the place, the values which complement the lives of people in Islamic cities and the special functional-behavioral codes that assess the degree of success in consensus around Islamic thought. The understanding of values and concepts derived from Islamic thought in order to achieve a basic understanding which, in the end, leads to action is among the principles of social interaction place in Islamic thought. First the values are introduced to and accepted by the society. Then, these values are assessed on the basis of religious codes that are spread in communities, and, finally, converted into behaviour on the part of the people.  Western thought focuses on social interaction in a larger layer of the society that is social spaces and, to achieve this, tries to attract people to such spaces. A proper social interaction in this doctrine is the result of the congregation of people in public urban spaces.

Islam introduces the family as the first and most important basis for the formation of social interaction, where this interaction starts from individual members of the family and gradually spreads towards the society. Notions such as Axiology, Ethology, family events, special spaces for the elderly, the adjacency of the main space with semi-private spaces, guest issues, and other principles of social interaction spaces are evident in Islamic society. In a hierarchically complementing fashion, these principles stabilize the process of interaction in Islamic society through special social procedures. The architectural place of a Muslim architect attempts to reach Islamic values in social interactions and solid relationships of the people in the society. Islamic city shelters its members by a constructive and pleasant concept called social interactions.

Islamic Greh (Knot) is known as one of the significant geometric patterns in Islamic art and architecture. Because of the complexity of drawing, Greh is considered a prominent and complicated technique and an unknown subject in both artists and orientalist’s points of view. Grehs have been used as decoration in Islamic cultures for over a thousand years, yet have not still lost their attractiveness. Aside from its beauty, many historians and architects are interested in finding the mathematical and geometrical aspects of Greh. Regardless of some old books and documents which introduce the methods of drawing of Greh, many contemporary western researchers have attempted to reinvent their own new methods for drawing Greh. These new methods lead to establish a novel comprehensive insight to understand, draw and use Greh, presenting different results in comparison to traditional methods. The main concern of this paper is to enlighten the differences between traditional and modern methods, based on their applications. These differences could be distinguished well by looking at examples such as those Grehs that are embedded on a curved surface.

In this paper, we provide a comparison between traditional and contemporary methods for drawing Grehs. This comparison reveals that the main feature of traditional method is drawing Grehs according to the geometry of the surface on which they are embedded. This notion is called Chand-Zaminegi in Persian that could be explained by introducing Dast-Gardan Grehs which are impossible to be drawn via modern methods. Unlike common Grehs –which are drawn based on an interactive basic unit- Dast-Gardan is constructed according to the form and shape of the surface, so the measurement and shape of the surface alter the process of its design. Dast-Gardan patterns have been used to materialize the geometric order on a complicated surface like a curved-surface. If Greh is designed and produced by considering Chand-Zaminegi approach, it could be the extension of the traditional method.

This paper consists of six main sections. The first section is an introduction and the second one presents a comprehensive definition of Greh based on documents, books and also lessons taught by some Iranian professional artisans who inherited their profession from their ancestors. The third section introduces the various traditional methods for drawing Greh. This section also describes a sample which shows step-by-step procedures for generating a typical Greh by traditional approaches.  The fourth Section studies modern drawing methods and categorizes all contemporary efforts in seven types. The fifth section is allocated to explain the distinction between traditional and modern methods. For these purposes, some traditional terms like Chand-Zaminegi and Dast-Gardan patterns are introduced. The paper provides a conclusion in section six by explaining the results and suggesting some opportunities for future work

Blue Mosque is one of the works by Abul Mozaffar Jahanshah bin Qara Yousef, a member of Qaraqoyounlu tribe, in Tabriz. It was completed in 870 AH under Jan Beigum Khatoon's supervision (Jahanshah's wife).This mosque consists of diverse patterns including herbal and geometric ones as well as various epigraphs. Epigraphs which are mostly recorded by Kufic and Thulth scripts are in accordance with adjacent patterns to show moderation and harmony. The main objective of this research was to determine the effect of Mysticism and Sufism, including Hurufiye faction on epigraphs' content. The method employed in this paper was both descriptive and analytical. In line with this, data were collected through library research method and visiting the monument. Research findings showed that the greatest diversity of colors are specified to azure blue in epigraphs and white in epigraphs' script which are symbolic in community of the mystics. Moreover, sun and star patterns as well as Arabic logion are clearly revealed the impact of Mysticism and Sufism in creating ornaments of this great building during Qaraqoyounlu's age. Last but not the least, this paper showed that religious evolutions such as the existence of Hurufiye faction's beliefs along with Mysticism and Sufism had significant impact on the formation of patterns and epigraphs' contents of the building.