Bangladeshi mosque architect smashes glass ceiling

DHAKA: As one of the only female architects in a country where women rarely even enter mosques, Marina Tabassum was an unconventional choice to design Bangladesh’s new Baitur Rouf Mosque, which has just won a prestigious international prize.
But there is little of the conventional about the 45-year-old Tabassum or her design, which eschews traditional minarets and domes in favor of a single-story terracotta brick structure that is suffused with light and remains cool even in the scorching summer months.
Like most women in Bangladesh, Tabassum had barely set foot in a mosque when she was commissioned to design the building in 2005 after her grandmother donated a piece of land.
Few of Bangladesh’s mosques have dedicated sections for female worshippers, and most women pray at home.
But Tabassum visited over 100 before setting pen to paper for the Baitur Rouf Mosque in north Dhaka, focusing on creating a haven of peace in a poor neighborhood of one of the world’s most congested cities.
“We may not have a tradition of women going into mosques to pray in the Indian subcontinent, but I have experienced some really beautiful spiritual spaces. That has always been a great inspiration to me,” she told AFP in a recent interview.
The 45-year-old, who emerged as one of Bangladesh’s top architects after designing Dhaka’s Museum of Independence, says being a woman has not constrained her career.
“I think of myself as a professional. This whole notion of me being a woman really does not exist in my mind. It just does not exist,” she said.
The Aga Khan Award for Architecture is handed out every three years and rewards excellence in architecture serving Muslim communities.