Cathedral of Kars (Fethiye Mosque)

A Russian Orthodox church converted to a mosque, the most striking building in Kars city

The Cathedral of Kars — now the Fethiye Camii — is the most architecturally distinctive building in the city, a large Russian Orthodox church built by the tsarist administration between 1879 and 1888 after Russia's annexation of Kars. The building stands near the city centre and its dome is visible from the castle hill above.

The exterior is in a style typical of Russian Orthodox churches of the period — rounded apse, drum dome, decorative brickwork — but it has been a functioning mosque since 1920. The interior conversion replaced the Orthodox iconostasis and painted ceiling with the more austere aesthetic of Islamic worship. The building is open to visitors outside prayer times and represents, in a single structure, the complex layering of cultures that defines Kars.

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The building was constructed as a Russian Orthodox church between 1879 and 1888, shortly after Russia captured Kars in the Russo-Turkish War. It was converted to a mosque after the Turkish recapture of Kars in 1920 and is now called the Fethiye Camii (Victory Mosque). The building is an unusual hybrid — Orthodox cruciform plan and dome, but now used for Islamic worship, its interior stripped of icons and fitted with carpets.

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