Sabancı Central Mosque

The Sabancı Merkez Camii was completed in 1998, funded largely by the Sabancı family and the state, and built deliberately in the classical Ottoman manner - a central dome on four half-domes, six minarets, and proportions taken from the Sinan tradition rather than any modern idiom. It holds around 28,500 worshippers, which makes it the second largest mosque in Turkey, and it was built jointly by the Turkish Religious Foundation and the Sabancı Foundation on some 52,600 square metres of land. The interior is faced with Kütahya tile, calligraphy panels and a great deal of marble, bright and open, and the six minarets are the detail people notice, since six is unusual and associated with the Blue Mosque in Istanbul. Its position is the other half of it: it stands directly on the Seyhan bank next to the Roman Taşköprü, so the two-thousand-year-old bridge and the twenty-year-old mosque appear in the same frame, which is the shot every visitor to Adana takes. The riverside park around it is where the city walks in the evening.

The main sights

• The six minarets - the unusual count above the river.
• The tiled interior - Kütahya work and calligraphy panels.
• The dome system - central dome on four half-domes.
• The river setting - the mosque beside the Roman bridge.

When to go

April to May and October to November. Between prayer times for visiting; Friday midday is closed to sightseers. Evenings are best for the riverside.

Good to know

It is a modern building in a historical style - visitors expecting Ottoman-era fabric should know that. Working mosque rules apply: shoes off, modest dress, headscarf for women. Adana summers are brutal.

Nearby

The Roman stone bridge is immediately alongside; the Adana Archaeology Museum is across the river.

Key facts