Naqsh-e Jahan Square
— — a square built to hold a whole city's idea of itself.
Not only on a wall.
“A rectangle of stone and pale brick, almost 90,000 square metres of it, laid down by Shah Abbas at the turn of the seventeenth century. Four buildings define the edges: the Shah Mosque at the south end, the small Sheikh Lotfollah on the east, Ali Qapu Palace facing it, and the gateway to the Grand Bazaar at the north. Polo was played here once. Now there are families, fountains, men selling tea, and the long pool that catches the blue of the tilework on the south wall.
Naqsh-e Jahan Square, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Naqsh-e Jahan Square sits at the centre of Isfahan, in central Iran, on the Iranian plateau at about 1,574 metres above sea level. It measures roughly 160 metres wide and 560 metres long — close to 89,600 square metres — making it one of the largest historic public squares in the world. Shah Abbas I of the Safavid dynasty had it laid out beginning in 1598, when he moved his capital from Qazvin to Isfahan. UNESCO inscribed it as a World Heritage Site in 1979 under the name Meidan Emam. The four enclosing monuments form a single architectural composition.
The four monuments around the square are the high point of Safavid architecture. The Shah Mosque, finished in 1629, carries one of the most photographed tiled domes in the Islamic world; its cobalt-and-turquoise mosaics cover roughly 18,000 square metres of surface. The Sheikh Lotfollah Mosque, smaller and without a courtyard, was built for the royal family and is known for the cream-and-rose dome whose colour shifts through the day. Ali Qapu's six-storey audience hall faces the mosque across the square, and the Qeysarie Gate at the north opens directly into Isfahan's covered Grand Bazaar.
The square is open day and night and costs nothing to walk. The four monuments charge separate admissions and keep their own hours, generally from about 9 a.m. to early evening, with the mosques closed to non-worshippers during prayer times. Friday mornings are quieter; late afternoon is when the long central pool begins to mirror the south façade and when most photographs are made. Carriage rides circle the perimeter. Tea houses set out cushions in the bazaar arcade along the north end. Modest dress is required to enter the mosques, and headscarves are available at the doors.