Sinan, the prolific Turkish architect, engineer, and town planner, builds the Süleymaniye Mosque in Constantinople from 1550 to 1558.

Sinan considers the design to be an architectural counterpoint to the Byzantine Hagia Sophia, converted under Mehmed II into a mosque that serves as a model to many Ottoman mosques in Istanbul.

Sinan's Süleymaniye is however a more symmetrical, rationalized and light-filled interpretation of earlier Ottoman precedents, as well as the Hagia Sophia, though it is smaller in size than its older archetype.

Located on the second Hill of Istanbul, it is today the city's second largest mosque and one of its best-known sights.