Swansea Mosque
Encyclopedia
Swansea
Swansea is a coastal city and county in Wales. Swansea is in the historic county boundaries of Glamorgan. Situated on the sandy South West Wales coast, the county area includes the Gower Peninsula and the Lliw uplands...
, Wales
Wales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
serving the Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
community in Swansea since the 1980s.
In order to cater for the needs of Swansea's growing Muslim community, a project is currently underway to redevelop a disused church building nearby on St. Helen's Road just yards away from the Mosque existing location. The New Mosque building was originally founded in 1862 as St. Andrew's Church. Built in 1864 by Scottish immigrants working in the drapery trade, St. Andrew's was at that time Swansea's only Presbyterian Church.
Designed by Mr John Dickson, the iconic façade with its decorative twin towers gives the building a towering perspective and beautifully set off the skyline surrounding St. Helen's Road. St. Andrew's later became a United Reformed Church before falling into dereliction. After fire damage in 1964, the rear hall was redesigned and rebuilt.
A Muslim Charity (Kafel Fund UK) bought the building from a private owner in 1997.. In 2004 following the merger of the charity with the Mosque, the current restoration and renovation plans commenced. When opened as Swansea's new Mosque this beautiful landmark building will once again be utilised for the worship of God, and its community centre welcome to all local residents.
The new mosque project attracted controversy in 2004 when the BNP circulated a leaflet with a view to generating opposition to the development of the new mosque.