History
History
Commissioned by Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, founder of the UAE, and inaugurated in 2007, the Grand Mosque of Abu Dhabi is a deliberate synthesis of the great Islamic styles: Mughal domes, Moorish arches, minarets blending Mamluk, Ottoman and Fatimid influences. Conceived as a gesture of openness and dialogue between civilisations, the project drew on materials and craftspeople from around the world: white Macedonian and Italian marble, Austrian crystal, semi-precious stones from India and China, and a carpet woven in Iran.
Everything about it is superlative. Its 82 domes crown a building carried by 1,096 arcade columns; the 96 main columns of the prayer hall, grouped in fours, are clad in white marble inlaid with mother-of-pearl and semi-precious stones (lapis lazuli, red agate, amethyst) in a floral pattern inspired by the date palm. The central dome rises to 85 metres with a diameter of 32.8 metres, the largest in the building. Around the monument, reflecting pools covering nearly 7,900 square metres, tiled in varying shades of blue, mirror the arcades and columns in the water and light up at night. Designed to hold about 40,000 worshippers, it is open to visitors of every faith, a symbol of dialogue intended by its founder.
Anecdotes & highlights
- The carpet in the main prayer hall, hand-knotted in Iran by around 1,200 female artisans, took two years to complete (eight months of design, a year of knotting): with 5,400 square metres and 2.5 billion knots for nearly 35 tonnes, it has been recognised by Guinness World Records since 2007 as the largest hand-knotted carpet in the world. Assembled in nine separate pieces, it was flown to Abu Dhabi and stitched together on site so finely that the seams are invisible.
- The main chandelier in the prayer hall measures about 12 metres in diameter and 15.5 metres in height and weighs 12 tonnes, including 40 kg of 24-carat gold on its gilded stainless-steel frame, set with Swarovski crystals whose patterns echo the carpet's medallion design. It is the third-largest chandelier in the world, and the largest ever installed inside a mosque.
- A lighting system designed by the studio Speirs+Major (22 light towers, several hundred projectors) casts bluish clouds onto the white marble that follow the cycle of the Hijri lunar month: darker at the start of the month, they turn brilliant white at the full moon.
