Early in the morning, sunlight pours through the stained-glass windows of the Nasir al-Mulk Mosque in Shiraz and spills across the Persian carpets in bands of red, blue, yellow and green. Known around the world as the Pink Mosque, this Qajar-era masterpiece in southern Iran is one of the most photographed interiors in the Islamic world.

Nasir al-Mulk Mosque courtyard and façade reflected in a rectangular pool, Shiraz

Nasir al-Mulk Mosque: history and patron

The mosque was built between 1876 and 1888, during the reign of the Qajar dynasty. It was commissioned by Mirza Hasan Ali Nasir al-Mulk, a Shiraz aristocrat and son of Ali Akbar Qavam al-Mulk, who held the post of kalantar, the city’s chief administrator.

The design is credited to Mohammad Hasan-e-Memar, the architect who also worked on Shiraz’s celebrated Eram Garden, together with Mohammad Hosseini Shirazi and the tile master Mohammad Reza Kashi-Saz-e-Shirazi. The building was added to Iran’s National Heritage List in 1955 and is still protected by the Nasir al-Mulk endowment foundation.

Coloured light through stained-glass windows at Nasir al-Mulk Mosque

Stained glass and the winter prayer hall

The famous light show happens in the western prayer hall, or winter shabestan. Here a long wall of stained-glass windows faces the courtyard, and seven wooden doors decorated with gereh-chini, the Persian art of geometric wooden latticework, connect the hall to the open space outside.

Inside, two rows of six columns carry a series of arches and vaults. When the low morning sun strikes the coloured glass, the patterns are thrown across the carpets and up the columns, so the whole room seems to glow. The stained glass belongs to a Persian tradition of orsi windows, sash windows filled with coloured panes that were popular in Safavid and Qajar houses and palaces.

Coloured sunlight across the carpet between the mosque’s columns
Stained-glass colours spreading across the floor beneath decorated arches
Sunlight passing through stained-glass windows beside a row of columns
Bright stained-glass windows above a patterned red carpet

Why it is called the Pink Mosque

The nickname comes from the tilework. Alongside the classic Persian blues and yellows, the tile makers gave pink and rose tones an unusually prominent place. Floral and geometric motifs cover the vaults and walls, and a poem is inscribed on marble at the entrance.

Intricate pink, red and blue geometric patterns across a vaulted ceiling
Layered vault decoration above blue and pink tiled walls
Close view of interlocking geometric patterns across the mosque’s ceiling

The courtyard, or sahn, has a wide, shallow pool that mirrors the façades, and the north and south porches are each decorated differently, so it pays to walk all the way around.

Ornate vaults and arches reflected in the mosque’s glossy floor
Person beside stained-glass windows with coloured light falling across their clothing

Best time to see the light

The coloured light is strongest at sunrise and in the first hours of the morning, when the sun is low and shining straight through the winter hall’s windows. Later in the day the effect fades as the sun climbs. The mosque stands in Shiraz’s old Gowd-e Araban quarter, south of Lotf Ali Khan Zand Street and close to the Shah Cheragh shrine, so it combines easily with a walk through the historic centre.

Check official advice before planning a trip: the UK FCDO advises against all travel to Iran. Until travel is advisable again, the photographs by Mohammad Reza Domiri Ganji capture the mosque at its most luminous.

Ornately tiled passage framing a distant courtyard opening
Photos: Mohammad Reza Domiri Ganji

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