Description

Situated in Al Rayyan, a quarter on the outskirts of Doha, this relatively small mosque serves the immediate neighbourhood and adopts the same basic plan as some of the oldest mosques in the region. As with the first mosque erected in Yathrib under the prophet Muhammad or the mosque in Kairouan, both of which are derived from the traditional arrangement of an Arabic dwelling, this building is likewise characterised by a dualism of forecourt and prayer hall and does not have a dome.

Although at first glance a relatively plain concrete and masonry building rendered with a thin white plaster, 23 metres long and approximately 14 metres wide, the mosque in Al Rayyan has a more powerful and dynamic presence due to the longitudinal vault that covers the central section of the vestibule and the three lateral vaults that span the prayer hall. The unusual, almost baroque open staircase winds its way up to the circular tower of the minaret and heightens the dynamism of the building still further.

Seen in plan or elevation, the entrance vestibule occupies about two-fifths of the overall building, the prayer hall the remaining three-fifths. This relationship is also readily evident in reality: the proportions of two parts on one side and three on the other is immediately apparent in the subdivision of the building. From the entrance in the centre of the narrow end of the building next to the open stairway, the visitor passes beneath the barrel vault of the vestibule into a forecourt before proceeding on into the prayer hall. This almost square room is divided into equal parts by the three barrel vaults that span the room crosswise. The carpeted floor is green with lighter stripes marking ten rows for the faithful to pray. Each of the three wall panels to the left and right have a pair of smaller windows at ground level and a patterned grille or transenna in the arch beneath the roof formed out of plaster, the only decoration in the mosque. The prayer room has no women’s gallery at all.

Doha is the capital of Qatar, one of the states on the Persian Gulf. Founded in the mid-19th-century, the municipality became more affluent with increasing oil trade in the 1950s and today has a population of nearly 400,000. Large parts of Doha now have a nondescript character resembling many other “generic cities” as Rem Koolhaas has called them. The architect of the Al Furusia Mosque has instead called for a transformation of regional tradition as a means of maintaining the individual character and history of the nation, rather than unnecessarily subordinating its form and expression to a pattern of development driven by the global market economy.

Architettura e spazio sacro nella modernità, exhibition catalogue, Milan 1992, p. 226 | Atta, Anwar: Moscheebau in Qatar, thesis, Vol. 1, Munich 1993, p. 211, pp. 269- | Atta, Anwar: Moscheebau in Qatar, thesis, Vol. 2,­ Munich 1993, pp. 87-

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Originally published in: Rudolf Stegers, Sacred Buildings: A Design Manual, Birkhäuser, 2008.