A Brief History of the English Mosque

Islamic places of worship in England range enormously in design and scale and in turn illustrate the diversity of the nation’s Muslim population. There are estimated to be around 1,500 mosques in Britain - the majority are formed from houses or other converted buildings, with fewer than 20% purpose-built. The British Mosque is an architectural as well as social history and describes the evolution of Britain's Muslim communities through the buildings they have built. By presenting this architectural narrative for the first time, the book opens up a new field of study of British Islamic architecture. The architectural story charts a course from the earliest mosques formed from the conversion of houses to other large scale conversions through to purpose-built mosques and with these the emergence of an Islamic architectural expression in Britain.