Landmark Asia
Lotus Temple
The Lotus Temple in New Delhi, India, is shaped like a giant white flower! Its walls look like flower petals opening up.
The Lotus Temple, officially the Bahá'í House of Worship, stands in southern New Delhi, India. Opened in 1986, it takes its shape from a lotus flower, with 45 white concrete petals covered in white marble. It rises more than 34 meters and is surrounded by nine pools and large gardens.
The Bahá'í House of Worship in New Delhi, popularly called the Lotus Temple, was designed by the architect Fariborz Sahba and inaugurated in 1986. India's Tentative List entry describes a nine-sided building of 45 thin concrete shell 'petals' in five sets of nine, rising more than 34 m, clad in white Pentelikon marble and set among nine pools on 27 acres of gardens.
Photo: Arian Zwegers, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Discover the Lotus Temple
The Lotus Temple is in New Delhi, a big city in India. It looks like a white flower that is just opening.
The flower is called a lotus. Around it are pools of water and gardens.
The Lotus Temple stands in southern New Delhi, India. Its official name is the Bahá'í House of Worship, but it is popularly called the Lotus Temple because of its shape.
The building takes its inspiration from the lotus flower. It has nine sides, rises more than 34 meters, and sits in 27 acres of landscaped gardens.
India's entry on UNESCO's Tentative List (submitted by the Indian government) describes the Bahá'í House of Worship, popularly called the Lotus Temple, as an expressionist building that takes its inspiration from the lotus flower. It is nine-sided, rises more than 34 m and sits on 27 acres of landscaped gardens in southern New Delhi.
The entry adds that the building is often called the 'Taj Mahal of the 20th century', and reports more than 100 million visitors in its first 27 years.
- Where
- southern New Delhi, India
- Height
- more than 34 m
- Petals
- 45, in five sets of nine
- Inaugurated
- 1986
Built by hand
Many workers built the temple, much of it with traditional tools.
It took almost ten years from the first drawings to the finished building.
The architect Fariborz Sahba designed the building. From the first design to the end of construction took nearly ten years, and it was inaugurated in 1986.
About 40 engineers and around 800 workers from many parts of India built it, including many women. Much of it was built with traditional methods and tools.
Designed by the Iranian-Canadian architect Fariborz Sahba, the building took nearly a decade from design to completion and was inaugurated in 1986. The Tentative List entry says much of it was built with traditional building methods and tools, by forty engineers and around 800 skilled and unskilled workers from different parts of the country, including many women.
The entry stresses that the very complex design had to be built without sophisticated equipment, which called for great engineering skill carried out through traditional workmanship.
Petals of concrete
Each petal is made of thin concrete. The petals come in groups of nine.
Some petals open outward, and some point inward, like a flower bud.
The building has 45 petals made of thin concrete shells, arranged in five sets of nine. The outermost nine petals open outward and form nine entrances. The next nine point inward, and together these two sets roof the outer hall.
The third set of nine looks partly closed, like a bud. Inside them, two more sets of nine petals form a dome over the central hall, which seats 1,300 people.
According to the Tentative List entry, the 45 petals are thin, cast-in-place concrete shells in five sets of nine: three external and two internal. The outermost 'entrance leaves' open outward to form the nine entrances; the 'outer leaves' point inward, and together they roof the outer hall.
The third set, the 'inner leaves', appears partly closed, with only the tips opening out like a partly opened bud. Rising above the rest, it houses two inner sets of nine shells that form the dome over the central hall, which seats 1,300.
A marble jigsaw puzzle
The petals are covered with 10,000 pieces of white marble. Builders fit them together like a giant jigsaw puzzle!
Nine pools of water lie all around the building.
The outside of the petals is covered with white marble from Mount Pentelikon in Greece. It was cut to size in Italy and then sent to Delhi, where 10,000 pieces, each a slightly different size, were put together like a giant jigsaw puzzle.
Walkways, bridges and stairs run around nine pools, which stand for the floating leaves of the lotus.
The external petals are clad in double-curved white Pentelikon marble, quarried in Greece and cut to exact size and shape in Italy before being shipped to Delhi, where some 10,000 pieces, each slightly different, were assembled like a giant jigsaw puzzle.
Walkways with curved balustrades, bridges and stairs surround nine pools that represent the lotus's floating leaves. The entry lists engineering honors, among them a 1987 gold medal from the UK's Institution of Structural Engineers and recognition from the American Concrete Institute in 1990.
- Marble pieces
- 10,000, each a slightly different size
- Pools
- 9
- Central hall
- seats 1,300
Glowing at night
In this photo, it is night and the white petals glow with light. Can you count the petals that point to the sky?
This photo was taken on 7 December 2012, after dark. Lights shine up onto the white petals, so the building glows against the dark sky.
At the bottom, curved petals open outward over glass entrances, and a walkway runs around the building. The entrances glow from inside, and a tall, thin tree stands at the left.
The photograph (7 December 2012, by Arian Zwegers, from Flickr) shows the building lit from below against the night sky: the tall inner petals at the center, the inward-pointing outer leaves, and the outward-curving entrance leaves sheltering lit glass entrances above a walkway.
The Tentative List entry was submitted by India in 2014; the building is not on the World Heritage List.
Amazing facts
-
The marble was put together like a giant jigsaw puzzle!
About 10,000 pieces of marble, each a slightly different size, were fitted together on the petals like a giant jigsaw puzzle.
Some 10,000 marble pieces, each slightly different, were assembled on site like a giant jigsaw puzzle after being cut in Italy.
-
The marble came all the way from Greece!
The white marble on the petals came from Mount Pentelikon in Greece, the same kind of marble used for the Parthenon.
The petals are clad in Pentelikon marble from Greece, the same grade used for the Parthenon, according to the Tentative List entry.
-
The building has nine doors, made by nine petals!
The outermost nine petals open outward and form nine entrances all around the building.
The outermost set of nine 'entrance leaves' opens outward and forms the nine entrances around the outer hall.
Words to know
- lotus
- a water plant with large flowers that grows in ponds
- petal
- one of the colored parts around the middle of a flower
- concrete
- a strong building material made from cement, sand, gravel and water that sets hard like stone
- shell structure
- a thin, curved building surface, a little like an eggshell
- marble
- a hard stone that can be polished until it shines
- architect
- a person who designs buildings
Discovery challenge
-
What flower is the building shaped like?
Which flower gave the Lotus Temple its shape?
From which flower does the building take its inspiration?
- A lotus
- A sunflower
- A tulip
Show the answer
A lotus
A lotus!
The lotus flower.
The lotus.
-
How many petals does the building have?
How many concrete petals make up the building?
How many shell 'petals', in five sets of nine, make up the structure?
- 45
- 5
- 100
Show the answer
45
45 petals!
45.
45.
-
What white stone covers the petals?
What stone covers the outside of the petals?
Which stone, quarried in Greece, clads the external petals?
- Marble
- Coal
- Brick
Show the answer
Marble
White marble!
White marble from Greece.
Pentelikon marble.
-
Which country is the Lotus Temple in?
In which country is New Delhi?
In which country's capital region does the Bahá'í House of Worship stand?
- India
- Greece
- Canada
Show the answer
India
India!
India.
India.
-
How many pools are around the building?
How many pools surround the Lotus Temple?
How many pools, representing the lotus's floating leaves, surround the building?
- 9
- 1
- 20
Show the answer
9
Nine pools!
Nine.
Nine.
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For parents & teachers
What children will learn
- Explain how thin, curved concrete shells can be strong.
- Describe how the building's design copies the shape of a lotus flower.
- Count the patterns of nine in the building's plan.
Recommended ages: 4 to 17 · About 15 minutes
Talk about it
- Why might an architect choose a flower as the idea for a building?
- The marble was cut in Italy and fitted in India like a puzzle. Why would careful measuring matter?
- Most of the building was made with simple tools. What would be hard about that?
Try at home or in class
- Fold paper petals into a lotus shape with an outer, middle and inner ring.
- Bend a strip of card into a curve and test how much weight it holds compared with a flat strip.
Key vocabulary: lotus, petal, concrete, shell structure, marble, architect
Where these facts come from
- Wikidata , Wikimedia Foundation (CC0 1.0)
- Baha'i House of Worship at New Delhi (Tentative List) , UNESCO World Heritage Centre (submitted by India)
- File:Lotus temple in Delhi, India.jpg , Wikimedia Commons
- Wikimedia Commons , Wikimedia Foundation (Per file (public domain, CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA); see each media record)
Checked, not yet human-reviewed. Last updated November 1, 2026. Spotted a mistake? Tell us.