SPATIAL AND ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN ASPECTS IN COMMUNITY BASED MOSQUES

Abstract

Indonesia as one of the biggest Muslim countries in the world are very rich in the quality and quantity of
mosques architecture. The largest number of mosques in Indonesia is designed, built, and developed by local
communities. Unfortunately, the potention of these kind of mosques is often unconsciously forgotten in the
field of architectural studies. Therefore, this research is held to define these mosques’ spatial and
architectural design aspects which were considered as appropriate for the needs of their local communities’.
As a descriptive-qualitative architectural research, the methods employed in this research are (1) field
surveying, (2) architectural documenting, and (3) informal interview, which were held in three purposive
sample of mosques: Masjid An-Nur Jagalan, Masjid Gading Pesantren, and Masjid Jami’ Kauman Malang. These
three mosques were chosen because of their close relations with their surrounding communities and their long
time developments by their local societies. The result of this study shows that some specific spatial and
architectural elements which were found in these community based mosques are (1) the scale, size, and depth
of space, (2) the classification and the placement of space, (3) the architectural expressions, (4) the openness,
the boundaries, and the relationship between spaces, (5) the athmospherical qualities of space, (6) the
classification of the users in spaces, (7) the intensity of the users in spaces, and (8) the manner and the
position of the users in spaces.