Blue Mosque also known as Sultan Ahmet Mosque, is a historic mosque located in Istanbul, Turkey. It remains a functioning mosque, while also attracting large numbers of tourist visitors. It was constructed between 1609 and 1616 during the rule of Ahmed I. and it also comprises the founder Ahmet I.'s tomb, a madrasa and a hospice. Hand-painted blue tiles adorn the mosque’s interior walls, and at night the mosque is bathed in blue as lights frame the mosque’s five main domes, six minarets and eight secondary domes.
If you want to catch the best view of its architecture, you should approach it from the Hippodrome (the west side of the mosque).If you are a non-muslim visitor, you also have to use the west side entrance of the mosque.
Blue Mosque Tip:
You may want to ignore the people who will offer you an enrance to the mosque without queue up.Those people are mostly the shop owners/personnel who want to sell you something. You better line up and wait for your turn like other tourists do. Don't worry if the line looks a little bit long, mostly it moves fastly.
Entrance to the Blue Mosque:
You may need some useful information before visiting the Blue Mosque. These information is the same almost all mosques. Tourists mostly wonder about the entrance fee, dress code, do shoes allowed to wear inside and if not, where to put their shoes. Let us answer these questions.
You better plan your visit to Sultanahmet Area before noon so is won't be crowded much. The mosque host its prayers five times a day, the first one is at sunrise and the last one is at nightfall. So the mosque closes for 90 minutes for tourists at each pray time. Also the most crowded times for the mosque is the midday praying on Friday.
As a Muslim tradition, shoes are not allowed inside of all the mosques, so you should put your shoes in plastic bags that provided at the etrance for free. There is also no entrance fee for Blue Mosque.
While you enter to the mosque: If you are a man, you should be wearing pants, not shorts. If you are a woman, you should cover your hair and your shoulders with head coverings available at the entrance for free.
When you are inside of the mosque, please remain quiet and avoid using flash photography. As you know, it is a place of worship, so please avoid staring at and taking pictures of the prayers. On the way out, you can put used plastic bags in to recycling bins and return head covers to the staff.
Entrance is free but you can make donation to the mosque for maintenance costs. The donation box is at the exit.
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