The city of Shahjahanabad was founded by the Mughal ruler Shah Jahan (who had reached the zenith of his rule… architecturally during that period). By 1637 A.D. He began to realize the dearth of space in the then capital- Agra and other major cities of that time…like Lahore. The courts of these cities didn’t had enough space to conduct the grand ceremonies hosted by Shah Jahan properly. By the year 1639 A.D. he decided to shift his capital from Agra, and laid the foundation stone for a new capital of his kingdom which would be known as Shahjahanabad. The site of this new, fortified and walled capital was north of the earlier cities of Delhi, and some of its southern regions overlaps with some of the area settled by the Tughluqs in 14th Century.…show more content… The Persian influence largely accounting for the formalism and symmetry of the palaces gardens and boulevards. The designed infrastructure of Shahjahanabad comprised- The Red Fort, The Friday mosque- Jama Masjid, the other major mosques; including the corresponding waqf properties, two main boulevards, the bazaars around the Friday mosque, the elaborate system of water channels, the major gardens and the city wall. The arrangement of these planned elements was influenced by certain site features, which precluded absolute geometry
The Red Fort (Palace Complex)
The plan of the fort was made by Shah Jahan and two Muslim architects. The foundation stone of the fortified place was laid in 1638. Construction work began in 1639 and was complete in just nine years. The palace complex, located along the western river front was built as an ideal residence for the emperor, it was conceived and designed as a paradise on Earth. The layout of the fort was drawn on a formal geometrical plan actually an irregular octagon with two long sides on east and west. It had two gates, that on the west was called the Lahori Darwaza, while that on the south was the Delhi Darwaza. Bearing on the cardinal points, the elements of the fort were arranged in the geometrical pattern that reflected the life and customs of Mughal…show more content… It was laid out in a planned fashion, in addition to the road planning of Chandni Chowk.city walls. The layout of the city walls was based on a geometrical planning; i.e. to say, a polygonal plan with gateways. The four main gates were Delhi Darwaza on south, the Ajmeri Darwaza on the south-west, the Lahori Darwaza on the west and the Kashmiri Darwaza on the north. These important gates were positioned according to the basic network of the city, being laced on the cardinal points. The graphic representation of the city was indicated geometric planning and the geometric placement of the main
