Istanbul Blue

Also called the Sultan Ahmet mosque and built across from the Hagia Sofia, the exquisite Blue Mosque in Istanbul is the only mosque other than the Masjid al Haram in Mecca that has six minarets.

The Blue Mosque – Istanbul, Turkey

Most visitors enter from the North. But if you take the west entrance you will be rewarded by the sight of these spectacular cascading domes! (Alternately enter from the North and go around the side and exit from the West, although the impact is far less than walking into the ablution courtyard from the front.)

And oh yes, the Blue Mosque is not blue at all…it gets its name from its blue Iznik tile clad interior.

Thank you for visiting and have a great day!

Posted by

Madhu is an Interior designer turned travel blogger on a long sabbatical to explore the world. When not crafting stories on The Urge To Wander, she's probably Tweeting @theurgetowander or sharing special moments on instagram.com/theurgetowander

90 thoughts on “Istanbul Blue

  1. It would be wonderful to see this in person, Thanks for sharing πŸ™‚

  2. I knew you would come up with something cool, Madhu … you always do. πŸ™‚ I love the mosaics and the domed components of this mosque … and of course, the fact that it is blue pretty much makes it a winner for this week’s theme.

    1. Oh, you flatter me as always Marcy πŸ™‚ The blue interior is difficult to capture, but it IS called the Blue Mosque!

  3. Beautiful inside and out, and on the side. Big dome and smaller domes. It looks so interesting. Not only that ….

    You centered the picture (1st image) so so well. Impressive!

    1. If you want to do it badly enough, you will make it happen. Thank you for dropping by Albadr, Loved your entries

  4. I loved the Blue Mosque and Instanbul, even though I didn’t appreciate it that much when I was there… Now I miss it. Lovely pictures πŸ™‚

  5. Wow, thanks for sharing this. It’s great to see inside the blue mosque! I just love the intricacy and beauty of Islamic art, tiling, patterns and calligraphy. It’s magnificent.

  6. Blue? Istanbul for sure! I wondered whether you’d do the Blue Mosque! Beautiful photos, Madhu (my old slides are a bit degraded so it’s marvellous to see it in crisp clear colour like that). πŸ™‚

      1. A couple of girls have talked about the restoration process – Madhu, you’d need a degree in high computer gobbldigook just to decipher the directions, let alone follow them! Some of the slides aren’t too bad, nut nothing like the clarity of your digital …

  7. I proposed to my wife in between the Blue Mosque and the Aya Sophia. Not bad for a guy from a small town in the US. Thanks for sharing this, it brings back memories.

    1. How wonderful! Cannot think of a more romantic setting! Thank YOU for the visit and comment. Hope to see you around πŸ™‚

Let me know what you think

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s