In Tehran, Architects Design A Modernist Mosque Without Minarets, And Conservatives Freak Out

The site for the mosque is next to the City Theater, one of Tehran’s landmarks of modern architecture, and authorities were very concerned that the new building not overshadow its neighbor. So the architects designed a spare, low-rise building that sweeps up from the ground toward the focal point of worship. Now religious hardliners are refusing to recognize it as a mosque at all.