Faisal mosque
The Shah Faisal Mosque ( English Shah Faisal Masjid , Urdu شاه فيصل مسجد) is the national mosque of Pakistan ( Pakistan Ke Qaumi Masjid ). It is located in the northwest of the Pakistani capital Islamabad in front of the Margalla Hills. It was named after King Faisal of Saudi Arabia .
Due to its special architecture and size, the gold-decorated mosque is the city's landmark today. The building, designed in the late 1970s and completed in 1986, together with its courtyard, can accommodate up to 74,000 worshipers.
history
In 1966, while visiting Islamabad, the then King of Saudi Arabia, Faisal ibn Abd al-Aziz, took a liking to the place in front of which he could see all of Islamabad and proposed the construction of a huge mosque.
In 1969, a competition was announced in which architects from 17 countries submitted proposals for the design of the future mosque. After four days of consultation, the design by the Turkish architect Vedat Dalokay was selected.
Construction of the mosque began in 1976. The Saudi Arabian government assumed the cost of 130 million Saudi rials . King Faisal personally helped finance the mosque. After his assassination in 1975, the mosque and the road leading to it were named after him. The mosque was completed in 1986.
construction
The mosque, an extraordinary and very modern construction with four minarets , covers an area of 5000 square meters. The prayer hall, which is square in elevation, is modeled on the shape of an Arab Bedouin tent . It reaches a height of 40 meters. The 90 meter high, slender minarets are based on Ottoman models; they are the tallest in South Asia. There is space for around 10,000 people in the prayer hall, 24,000 in the entrance area and another 40,000 in the courtyard. This makes it one of the largest mosques in the world. The entire complex also contains rooms for an Islamic research center, a library, a museum and an auditorium.
The central lighting is realized by a ball made of gold anodized aluminum tubes, which carry a light bulb at each end, as well as a large ring of downlights. The sphere formed by the approx. 1000 light bulbs has a diameter of approx. 10 meters, the “satellite” ring consists of 40 lights and has a diameter of approx. 40 meters. A curtain made of gold-colored decorative chains creates the connection between the individual lights. This lighting was designed at the time by the German lighting designer Johannes Dinnebier in collaboration with the architect and in 1985 under the direction of K.-M. Jahn realized in Islamabad.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b archnet.org: Faisal Mosque ( Memento of the original from May 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
Coordinates: 33 ° 43 ′ 47 " N , 73 ° 2 ′ 14" E