Hasht Bihisht Palace

Hasht Behesht

eight heavens (in Persian)

هشت بهشت

Eşfahān, Eşfahān, Iran

Eastern side of Chahar Bagh-e Abbasi St

Iran

1669

17th century

Architecture and City Planning

palaces

houses

dwellings

residential structures

official residences

Safavid (style)

Safavid dynasty (period)

Islamic

Iranian

Persian

brick

wood

marble

vaulting

wood frame

Hasht Behesht Palace

Isfahan

pavilion

Persian garden

iwan

portico

wooden pillar

partial view including Northern iwan and part of the landscape, view from Northern iwan

Located in the center of the Garden of Nightingales (the Bagh-e Bulbul), the Hasht Behesht is one of Isfahan's two surviving Safavid pavilions. Built under Shah Sulaiman some twenty years after the Chihil Sutun, it is quite different in style from the earlier pavilion, although it exhibits the same concern for the interplay of interior and exterior spaces. 'Hasht Behesht' translates as 'Eight Paradises' and refers to a Timurid palace building type consisting of two stories of four corner rooms around a central domed space. In Isfahan, the corner rooms are octagonal, forming massive pillars that define four large openings leading to large porches in the south, east and west, and an iwan in the north. The vault of the central space is detailed with polychrome muqarnas and is capped with a lantern.

Saif Haq

Saif Haq

© Saif Haq

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