Bangladeshi mosque architect smashes glass ceiling

DHAKA: As one of the only female architects in a country where women rarely even enter mosques, Marina Tabassum was an unconventional choice to design Bangladesh's new Baitur Rouf Mosque, which has just won a prestigious international prize.

But there is little of the conventional about the 45-year-old Tabassum or her design, which eschews traditional minarets and domes in favor of a single-storey terracotta brick structure that is suffused with light and remains cool even in the scorching summer months.