The Central Adelaide Mosque, also known as the Adelaide City Mosque or the Adelaide Mosque, is a mosque in Adelaide, South Australia. It was formerly known as the Afghan Chapel. The mosque was built in 1888–1889, with the four distinctive minarets added in 1903. It is Australia’s oldest permanent mosque. The mosque was originally built to meet the spiritual needs of “Afghan” cameleers and traders who came in after working in South Australia’s northern regions. After the congregation dwindled and the mosque fell into disrepair in the early twentieth century, it was resurrected by post-World War II Muslim migration and has since thrived.

Initially, the mosque had similar architectural attributes of the few adjacent buildings in the area. The form was a simple rectangular building measuring 12*7.5 meters in size) featuring a simple hipped roof, which was a typical feature of the architecture in Adelaide in the later 1880s.  The interior walls of the bluestone mosque were white washed in 1890. The mosque featured a “mihrab” or alcove with a tiny round window, shaped as an acoustic niche in the western wall, so that devotees faced north-west to Mecca. Small arched niches set in the interior white-washed walls held copies of the Koran. however, over time the white wash cracked on the inner mosque walls, so today protective timber laminate lines the interior walls and ceiling. On the interior walls were glassed windows and framed pictures giving views of Mecca and sacred cities including the Prophet’s tomb. The interior concrete floor was covered with strips of matting made by the cameleers. Prayer mats, side by side, were used by worshippers to kneel on when at prayer. Interior lighting was supplied by a kerosene lamp suspended from the ceiling and exterior lighting was supplied by torches attached to the exterior walls. Tessellated tiles of various shapes, size and colour paved the porch floor. The porch was enclosed with numerous graceful arched columns protected by wrought iron tracery. The original wooden fencing was replaced in the 1890s by higher, red brick walls and a wooden lattice gateway that enclosed the mosque and its grounds.

The four 20-meters high chimney-shaped minarets that were added in 1903 to the mosque’s corners reflecting the outstanding profile of Afghan, Indian and Turkish precedents. The minarets are distinctive, cylindrical, slender constructions. Their diameter is about three feet at the base and gradually diminishes in girth as they rise.

There were no ladies to worship in the mosque as Cameleers were not permitted to bring their own women to South Australia. However, as the size of the congregation of the Adelaide City mosque has continued to increase, the mosque was upgraded to accommodate their needs, and as a mean of showing the integration of Adelaide’s Muslims with the mainstream society. Those upgrades include major renovations in 1978 in response to the large Muslim migration to Australia to create a larger prayer hall and a place to accommodate women’s needs. Recently, modern steel vaults were added to the courtyard to shelter an increased number of worshippers during Friday prayers, and creating additional space to be used during Eid and Ramadan festivals.

This mosque is of great significance as it is the only mosque in the city of Adelaide’s square mile. It was the first mosque to be built in an Australia city, and after 1950 different countries of Muslim migrants have come to Adelaide. Adelaide mosque continues to be used by a cosmopolitan congregation.