Muradie Mosque
The Muradie Mosque, also known as the Lead Mosque, is a mosque located in Vlorë, Albania. Situated in downtown Vlora on a central square, the mosque is surrounded by roads on all four sides, west of Sadik Zotaj, south of Lef Sallata and east of Papa Kristo Negovani streets.
The mosque was built between 1537 and 1542 CE, designed by Turkish architect Mimar Sinan in the Ottoman style, during the Ottoman Empire rule of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent. The mosque was designated as a Cultural Monument of Albania.
Architecture
The structure consists of the main building and the minaret. The prayer hall is approximately, while the minaret is tall. The structure initially contained a portico that was destroyed at a later date. The mosque has a dome with a supporting polygon raised base, arched windows and classical triangular forms topping the side walls. The brick work of the Muradie Mosque has layers with two different brick colours. There is also a contrast between the texture, quality, colour, as well as size and sequence of the bricks used to build the Islamic prayer hall compared with the larger white chiseled stones used to build the minaret.It is believed that the cultural monument was designed by Mimar Sinan, a leading mosque builder in the Ottoman Empire and the author of the Great Suleymaniye Mosque in Constantinople.