International Journal of

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It is accepted that the visual comfort in schools depends on the quality of the whole visual environment. This leads to the concern upon the quality and quantity of lighting. Currently in Iran, in order to calculate energy transfer for public buildings a coefficient is usually used. This coefficient considers the rate of sunlight energy absorption in these kinds of buildings. To increase the degree of accuracy in the calculation mentioned above, the authors suggest a simulation programme that can do the job precisely and accordingly. It seems that, in order to calculate the energy requirements of school buildings in Iran for heating, cooling and lighting, it is better to use a simulation programme, too. In fact, this paper considers details of lighting as part of a comprehensive programme and Iran schools design requirements for lighting. As we will see, this research describes the method of calculation of daylighting, which is used in the part of lighting simulation programme. Effective daylighting design requires consideration of different factors such as daylight factor, luminous efficacy of solar radiation, orientation factor, glass transmittance factor, average reflectance of material and etc. which are need for calculation of exterior and interior luminance. They are discussed in details in this paper.

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  In this paper, authors tackle three very important questions that need to be answered if a theory of design is to be constructed. The first is what designers do, Which we attempt to illustrate with the help of case studies and theories of design practice. The second question is what guides designers. Here, authors try to present some of the proposed normative positions about design, to show the similarities and differences between positions and a framework of how they can be categorized. The main (third) question is how the design thinking process can be represented drawing upon on a review of recent studies of design practice and designer's creativity.

  One approach to design thinking is to extract the features of the designers' strategic knowledge, for which comparative studies between expert designers and novices are useful. Also, controlled experimental studies may be adopted in order to understand the nature of the idea generation process.

Finally, the methods of research and representation of design thinking in order to gain a deeper understanding of the designers' creativity are proposed.

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Experts have found that natural environment could have positive impacts on patient’s treatment process. The impact of natural environment on mental state and lowering the stress level of the patients is undeniable. In this study, the impacts of natural environment on patient women in Tehran general hospitals were investigated. After conducting a topical study of the issue on hand, using field observation method, opinion of the patient women in a few of Tehran’s general hospitals was asked. Moreover, number of doctors and architects were asked to furnish the study with their opinion on this issue. After analysis of the answers, interesting conclusions on effect of open and green space on patient women were drawn. Based on these findings, designing open green spaces adjoined to the maternity ward could be in a way that encourages social behaviors, personal progress and convenient interaction with others and elevates mental and physical health of the patients.

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Lighting plays a key role in night escapes of urban spaces, in a way that it can be effective in giving identity to them. By considering this importance and inexistence of a process for composing urban Lighting strategy made this study to be conducted by the objective of providing process for compilation of context-oriented lighting strategy in urban spaces. Reaching a suitable solution for Lighting in urban spaces, a process is needed which can encompass all different aspects in the context of lighting. In this way, a process is proposed via that this shortage can be compensated. This process, at first considers basic urban studies including historical, cultural, religious, social, ceremonial and land-use and then the design scenario is propounded and in order to investigate the urban spaces context via space syntax method, the integration parameter is used. Later on, guiding is propounded which can be analyzed by Intelligibility parameter from space syntax method. And also designing alternatives can be analyzed by space syntax method. By studying the organizer structure and its prioritizing, we could achieve the lighting originated from the context. The last part of process is based on observance of the topics related to light pollutions which has a very critical role in lighting. In this study the analytic-descriptive research method with modeling and simulation are applied to achieve a context-oriented lighting process in urban spaces. The results of this study are showing that the provided process can be applied practically for lighting by considering the urban context. So this study has practical aspects and it can create a suitable strategy for lighting urban design and planning.

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In the developing world, skills in innovation and creative design have emerged as key attributes for graduating designers. Creativity is essential if we want to generate new solutions to the considerable and complex problems in architecture. Metaphor is frequently expressed as a key tool for enhancing creative design, yet little empirical research has been performed on how novice designers can use it within their design. The goal of this study is to empirically research the use of metaphor in the design studio, with a focus on its effects on design creativity and quality. A three-stage method is presented, which allows novice designers to use meanings and metaphors in the early stages of design and idea generation. This method was tested in an architectural studio with two groups as experiment and control groups. The results were evaluated using a qualitative research methodology and a questionnaire was prepared in which the students were requested to assess the use of this method in their design process. Also expert designers evaluated the design outcomes in both control and experiment groups. The results highlight that metaphor is a helpful tool for young designers to stimulate design creativity and has a noticeable effect on design quality factors such as novelty, value, flexibility, usefulness and detail. These research findings have different implication for novice architects and help them enhance creativity and quality in their design endeavors.

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In today’s mechanized world, the need for a patient-friendly attitude in the hospitals and its psychological effects on the recovery time of patients has been proven. Considering the special pre and post-partum conditions of a pregnant woman, together with the fact that the mother and child cannot be treated as a patient case, makes these psychological effects more critical in this research, the mental state of pregnant women in association with the social support they receive, and its role on their stay and recovery, was considered. In this research we investigated the role of maternity ward architectural design on the quality of mothers social interactions. To achieve this, a survey has been conducted on the affect of maternity ward architectural design on the mothers social interactions with visitors, medical board, and other patients in maternity units of Tehran’s General Hospitals.
It was found that the establishment of social communications with visitors, hospital staff, and other patients had significantly positive psychological effects on patients. Not only the mental health status of patients was improved, also their recovery time was reduced. This was concluded that the design of healthcare centers should provide maternity unit’s patients effective communication opportunities by providing an appropriate space for patients companies, family members, and visitors.

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Outdoor spaces and their thermal condition is becoming a controversial issue in modern architecture and urbanism. It has a great effect on people who use the open spaces like campuses where many students from different cities spend most of their time. This research investigated the effect of SVF, MRT and PET in the two campuses namely: Iran University of Science and Technology (IUST) and Amirkabir University of Technology (AUT). Thermal condition of campuses has diverse states due to their different level of shaded open spaces. PET is calculated via Rayman for thermal-comfort assessment in spring and summer, 2015. Subsequently, it was determined that by decreasing SVF to 0.4, Tmrt declines to 3.04°C. The variations of MRT's influence PETs drop. PET comparison in two campuses illustrates that in an average value of PET, there is 0.86°C dissimilarity between campuses in the warmest time of the year (July). IUST campus is 1.39°C cooler on the PET measure. In conclusion, increasing shaded spaces by increasing green spaces and trees can create cooler campuses. Integrated design of shaded open spaces with their architectural forms is recommended as a design strategy for the designers to create a responsive environment in terms of thermal comfort. By this means, cooler campuses are more prone to be used by students and their activities.

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Today, the use of building information modeling (BIM) has become widespread in developed countries; however, in Iran, the use of BIM-based software has received less attention for some reasons. In the present study, in the first phase, library studies and data collection related to research objectives have been surveyed. Then the identification of indigenous indices of green architecture in Iran was identified and explained through the Delphi method with Kendall's W correlation coefficient in SPSS software as a table Test Statistics. Finally, a green villa building in the Lavasan area in Tehran was detected and designated as a sample to be studied. The building was simulated using Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) technologies in order to better understand its environment. Moreover, the energy consumption of the mentioned building during the previous year was studied by modeling it in Revit software. The results of the research indicate that the selected building, which has been claimed to be green, has a distance of 58 kWh / m² with the global standards of ASHRAE and LEED. Accordingly, the studied building does not have the fundamental requirements and basic principles to receive the green building certification according to these international rating systems. Thus, with regard to the green building information modeling in Iran, it could be inferred that due to the lack of an indigenous guide (in terms of energy consumption) provided by the authorities, the environmental ecosystems as global assets are at risk.

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Given the crucial role of medical buildings in emergency situations, health maintenance, and disease control, as well as the importance of ensuring user comfort, recent architectural studies have emphasized the need to revise design criteria. One of the key considerations for creating comfortable environments in hospitals is managing undesirable lighting. Although research underscores the importance of sufficient and appropriate natural light in reducing patients' length of stay, reliance on general standards may not adequately address the needs of specific patient groups. To assess visual comfort in an ophthalmic ward while minimizing the potential biases and limitations of human studies, this research utilized an in vivo animal model using rabbits. Rabbits were selected due to their physiological similarities to humans, especially regarding the visual system, making them appropriate subjects for studying cataract-related reactions. Moreover, animal studies offer better control over environmental factors, ethical considerations, and reproducibility compared to human studies, where individual variations and external factors can affect results. In this study, daylight simulation and its effects were analyzed through a point-by-point illuminance comparison using Rhinoceros modeling software, Grasshopper, and HoneybeePlus version 1.4.0. The results demonstrated a 15.19% discrepancy between the visual comfort limits set by international standards and the expectations of patients with cataract eye problems. This inconsistency has led to a 22.44% reduction in the comfort levels within the patients' rooms.