ZEMCH 2015 - International Conference Proceedings | Page 212

Introduction
Nowadays in modern life, every technology and technique for comfortable life is available. People
with low-income levels or economic power can also have those facilities to stay warm in winter and
stay cool in summer. Many years back when there were no modernized systems for human needs,
passive strategies played a big role in peoples’ life at the time. This paper focuses on a small city in
Iran where vernacular architecture had played a key role for sustaining certain needs in life for people through special strategies that have been used to solve people’s environmental and architectural issues, not only during those days but also even until today. The city is called Evaz and located
in the Fars region of Iran with distance about 20 km from Gerash city and 370 km from south east of
Shiraz. Evaz receives minimum rainfall, which is the reason why water is restricted in this area, and
traditionally, vernacular architecture provided solution for many years. Therefore, cisterns (water
storage) are used and the focus of this study is in more detail on this element in this paper.
The reason of selecting Evaz is the special climate and urban criteria this city has, which is extremely challenging for urban planners, architects and designers in general, and for addressing
sustainability issues for the future. This city has a very limited resource, such as water and electricity power. These problems have generated another sociability issue; many of residents migrated
to different cities and are out of the country. The research identifies the architectural strategies
of vernacular architecture in Evaz in order to generate ideas for transformation plus connections
with the modern and traditional fundamentals. Furthermore, the study aims to develop some
solutions utilizing a combination from modern an d traditional designs in order to suggest better
and more useful ways to save energy, and at the same time, sustainable design performance.

Methodology
The methodology used in this research is the qualitative method. Intensive literature review has
been carried out to identify as much information as possible from existing literature. To collect
further information on local level, field studies were undertaken involving interviews with local
people and data collection through observation. Studying photographs of current situation in
the city of Evaz, involving cultural personalities of Evaz for their consultancy and online surveys
with Evazi people are some of the other methods used in the research to further enhance the
study and the investigation intended on the vernacular techniques of Evaz.

The City of Evaz
Evaz sites at 54 degrees southeast 53 minutes east longitude, north latitude and longitude from
Greenwich meridian, 27 degrees 34 minutes. It receives minimum rainfall, which is the reason
why water is restricted in this area (IAU 2015). In summers, the climate is hot and dry, sometimes
temperatures reaching around 46°C during the day. Although the winters are typically cold and
likewise dry, moderate climate is available in Evaz during autumn and spring.
From the climatic conditions, the area’s climate is hot and dry, with average rainfall of 220-180 mm
per year, which is more influenced by the Mediterranean air masses in autumn and winter. Maximum temperature 48-46 degrees for the months of July and August, and a minimum temperature
of zero degrees, is related to the months of December and January. There is limited agricultural
area in this city, the famous tree and landscape includes citrus trees, palm trees and planting
vegetables. The average relative humidity of this area is maximum 58% and minimum 29%. The
number of frost days; 51 days has been reported (IAU 2015) (Fig.1). The most important reason behind this is the lack of water resources, extreme heat, irregular rainfall annually, and cheap lands.

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ZEMCH 2015 | International Conference | Bari - Lecce, Italy