British Mosques

This book, a collaboration between the Victoria and Albert Museum and the University of Westminster, captures the British mosque at a pivotal moment in its history. There are 1,800 mosques in the UK today mostly converted from terraced houses, libraries, cinemas and supermarkets. Now, these improvised spaces are beginning to disappear, as Muslim communities replace them with purpose-built structures. This timely exploration of the British mosque reveals how ad-hoc adaptations have evolved into a uniquely British-Islamic architecture, tracing its development through waves of twentieth-century migration, and further back to the Orientalist visions of Victorian collectors. Born out of two projects at the Venice Architecture Biennale and the V&A, British Mosques brings together perspectives from curators, architects and artists. Using approaches ranging from archival study to site-specific installations and 3D scanning, together they tell the story of a hybrid architecture that has quietly found its place in Britains urban landscape. British Mosques is co-published by Foolscap Editions and the V&A.