Friday, June 9, 2017

Here’s what we did in Iran IX

Central square in Old Yazd, showing wind towers and the monumental Amir Chaqmaq complex













Our group from the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, on the way to dinner in Old Yazd at sunset, Jameh Mosque in the background

Yazd, an oasis surrounded by the mountains of the high desert, is graced with great Islamic architecture.  But what I found most paintable were the many windtowers found in the narrow, shady streets of Old Yazd.

Yazd Iran



Neighbourhood mosque in Old Yazd
Watercolour, crayon and computer
©2017 Charlene Brown

According to Wikipedia, windtowers, or windcatchers, are traditional Persian architectural elements providing natural ventilation by catching the wind from any direction and directing it down into the building. Windcatchers can be found in traditional Persian-influenced architecture throughout the Middle East, including the Gulf Arab states, especially Dubai.  That is where I first saw them.

According to the World Bank, Dubai is one of the largest consumers of energy per capita in the world and in the summer months an estimated two thirds of that is used for air conditioning. There has been some hopeful theorizing that the windtower concept could be integrated into new buildings there and this might make a meaningful reduction in their “AC addiction.”