Plain Exteriors

Islam advocates plainness in appearance. This applies to

architecture as much as it does to the color of external
clothing and the use of more basic materials such as brass or
wood in decorative arts. A house designed along Islamic
principles may appear undesigned on the exterior, and the
outside doesn't reveal anything about the mechanical structure
of the house. However, the interior of the house will usually
reveal a much more extravagant design approach. Houses are
typically built around a central courtyard that is invisible
from the outside but provides an outdoor space inside. Here
you'll find colorful tiling, fountains, fruit trees and flowers,
but the only decoration you'll find on the exterior is around
the entrance door.
Mosques

Mosque architecture is the form familiar to many in the West.

Early mosque design is called "hypostyle," which means it is a
quadrilateral shape surrounding a courtyard. Domes and cupolas
played an important part in Arab architecture long before the
emergence of Islam and they continue to be important features of
mosque design. Every mosque interior contains a niche in the
wall called the mihrab. This niche faces Mecca, the direction
Muslims face to pray. Each of the external walls contains a
niche -- called an iwan -- and the largest of these also faces
Mecca. The minaret is another characteristic of mosque
architecture. This is the tower where the muezzin calls the
faithful to prayer. Mosque interiors are highly decorated with
wooden screens of geometric marquetry and colorful tiling.
The Arch

Arches are one of the most distinctive features of Islamic

architecture and are found in almost every type of building.
Symbolically, they lead into an inner space. Islamic architects
borrowed heavily from Greek and Roman designs for archways and
door designs but then came up with a series of arch shapes over
history that are distinctively Islamic. For example, the Great
Mosque in Cordoba, Spain, has various examples of arch designs
including the horseshoe, the cinquefoil, the trifoil and the
semi-circular. The use of arches in this mosque is credited with
spreading Islamic arch design throughout Europe. Islamic
building also use arches to create colonnades lining the inner
courtyards of both houses and mosques.
Modern Islamic Architecture
The Burj Khalifa tower in Dubai may look like a typical 21st
Century glass and steel construction shooting up into the sky
like a glass shard, but its design is based on a desert flower
called the Hymenocallis, reflecting the traditional Islamic
principle of converting vegetal shapes into geometric designs.