Also known as: Fin Garden and Bath, Hammam-e Fin (Farsi), Baagh-e Fin (Farsi), Bagh-e Fin

The Fin Garden is regarded as one of the most beautiful gardens of its type, and it has been reported that this is the oldest surviving Persian garden in Iran. Reflecting its location and sacred symbolism, the Fin Garden is a masterpiece combining natural and man-made elements.

Designed for Shah Abbas I in the 16th century, this delightful garden with its symmetrical proportions, old cedars, spring-fed pools and fountains is renowned as being the very epitome of the Persian garden and its evocation of heaven. Given its influence in the planning of gardens as far afield as India and Spain, Fin Garden, which lies in the suburb of Fin, 9km southwest of central Kashan, has justly earned a place on the Unesco World Heritage list.

In contrast to the arid location, the garden flows with crystal-clear warm water channelled from a natural spring through a series of turquoise-tiled pools and fountains and continuing along the main road in jubs (canals, pronounced ‘joobs’). The evergreen trees inside the garden are up to 500 years old, and the profusion of complementary deciduous trees contributes to a garden that works to please year-round.

The highlights of the garden are two pavilions: the shotor gelou, a two-storey pool house with water running through the middle of the ground floor, and a recreational pavilion at the rear of the garden. Built in the later Qajar period, this delightful building sports an elaborate painted dome of outdoor vignettes (including a semi-naked beauty being surprised in the act of bathing). In the adjoining rooms, stalactite ceilings and coloured glass windows play a role in keeping visitors content with blue, white and green glass chosen to be cool and soothing and to make the room look bigger; in contrast, red, orange and yellow glass has the opposite effect, making the room seem warmer in winter.

Interestingly, red and blue combined apparently confuses insects and wards off mosquitoes.  Many Iranians head to the hammam complex along one side of the garden, famous as the place where the nationalist Mirza Taqi Khan, more commonly known as Amir Kabir, was murdered. Amir Kabir served as prime minister under Nasir od-Din Shah from 1848 to 1851. He was a moderniser who instituted significant change, especially in the fields of education and administration, but his popularity was not appreciated in the royal court and the shah’s mother eventually persuaded her son that he had to go. Amir Kabir was imprisoned in Fin Garden and eventually murdered in the bathhouse, though some say he slashed his own wrists. Inside, mannequins posed in scenes from the drama form the backdrop of many a selfie taken by those coming to pay homage to a hero.

With extra time to spare, the modest Kashani National Museum, which occupies a small pavilion in the grounds, is worth a quick visit. It showcases some fine examples of Kashani velvet and brocade, and has some ceramics and calligraphy. A scale model of the garden helps to show its perfect proportions from an aerial perspective.  Don't leave the garden without pausing at the Fin Garden teahouse, which is set within its own enchanted little garden. Located near the source of the spring, the current is thick with warm-water-loving fish and shaded with aged trees. The teahouse speciality is Kashan barley soup (IR50,000) in winter and rose-water ice cream in summer.

Fin Garden is at the end of Amir Kabir Rd, which can be reached by shuttle taxi (IR60,000) from Kamal al-Molk Sq or by taxi dar bast (closed door; IR180,000). Alternatively, you can hop on the green bus that travels from the corner of Ayatollah Kashani and Baba Afzal Sts in central Kashan with a pre-purchased card (IR60,000) from the bus terminal. During the journey, keep an eye open for the elaborate modern Italianate houses that line the road near the garden, evidence that the location continues to attract fashionable Kashanis.


Creation of the Fin Garden:
The Fin Garden (known also in Persian as ‘Bagh-e Fin’) is a traditional Persian garden located in Kashan, in the central Iranian province of Isfahan. Today, the Fin Garden is one of the nine gardens that form the UNESCO World Heritage Site known as the ‘Persian Garden’. This garden is believed to have been created during the early part of the Safavid Dynasty, around the first half of the 16th century.
The current design, however, may be traced to the reign of Shah Abbas I, the 5th Safavid Shah of Iran, who reigned from 1588 to 1629. Nonetheless, the Fin Garden continued to be developed over time. One significant period of restoration and enlargement occurred during the reign of the 2nd Qajar Shah of Iran, Fath-Ali Shah Qajar, who ruled from 1797 to 1834.