Stylogenyin the style of Islamic Geometric & Calligraphic Tradition

Traditions & vernacular · c. 690–present · Middle East & North Africa, South Asia, Southern Europe

Islamic Geometric & Calligraphic Tradition

Also known as Islamic ornament, Arabesque & girih, Khatt (Arabic calligraphy)

A visual system shared across the Islamic world in which proportioned calligraphy, compass-and-straightedge geometry and the vegetal arabesque carry meaning and beauty in place of figurative imagery. Star-and-polygon tilings repeat across whole surfaces as if continuing beyond the frame, while Kufic, Thuluth and Naskh inscriptions give hierarchy to buildings, manuscripts and objects.

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An all-over geometric pattern combines blue star-shaped rosettes, turquoise leafy flourishes, and small rust-red diamonds on a near-black ground. Cream and gold interlacing bands connect and outline the repeating motifs.
AI-generated by Stylogeny from the style’s design choices. Not a real or historical work.

Use it with care

Qur'anic verses, the names of God and the Prophet and other sacred phrases must not be cropped, distorted, mirrored, used as texture or printed on floors, footwear or throwaway packaging; have any Arabic-script text read and approved by a fluent reader or calligrapher. Abstract geometric pattern is far less sensitive than script, but credit the traditions and makers it comes from.

01

How it works

  • Construct patterns with compass and straightedge from a circle divided into equal parts, then extend them into a repeating star-and-polygon tiling.
  • Fill the whole surface edge to edge with a continuous repeat that implies infinite extension beyond the frame.
  • Let script carry meaning and hierarchy: monumental Kufic or Thuluth bands for inscriptions, proportioned Naskh for reading text.
  • Interlace strapwork so lines pass alternately over and under, and fill the interstices with arabesque scrolls.
  • Contain text in cartouches, medallions and bordered panels, marking divisions with gold and lapis illumination.
  • Keep sacred contexts aniconic: express the sacred through geometry, script and light rather than figures.

Umayyad Jerusalem and Damascus; developed in Baghdad, Cairo, Isfahan, Istanbul, Granada and Delhi

02

Its design choices

From Stylogeny’s vocabulary of design choices: defining choices make the style, characteristic ones are usual, occasional ones turn up now and then.

Layout & composition
Space & hierarchy
Typography
Colour
Form & shape
Surface & texture
Ornament
Imagery
Medium & production
Tone & intent
Avoids
Naturalistic depiction, Distortion & exaggeration, Illusion of depth, Dynamic asymmetry, Straight photography, Ornament-free

Palette

  • #1d3f8a
  • #2a9d9b
  • #c8a046
  • #f2e9d8
  • #1b1b1b
  • #a63d2f

Typefaces

  • Kufic

    including square bannāʾī Kufic

  • Thuluth

  • Naskh

  • Nastaʿlīq

  • Maghribi

  • Dīwānī

Known for

  • Dome of the Rock, Jerusalem (691–92), mosaic inscriptions

  • Ibn Muqla (d. 940), proportioned scripts

    al-khatt al-mansub

  • Ibn al-Bawwab Qur'an

    1000–01, Chester Beatty Library

  • Alhambra, Granada (13th–14th c.), tilework and carved stucco

  • Darb-i Imam shrine, Isfahan (1453), girih tiling

  • Şeyh Hamdullah

    Ottoman calligrapher, 1436–1520

  • Mir Emad al-Hasani

    Nastaʿlīq master, d. 1615

03

Make something in this style

Say what you need, and Stylogeny’s image studio draws it from Islamic Geometric & Calligraphic Tradition’s design choices and checks it against them. It takes about a minute, and you get a link to share.

Rule out a choice, read the prompt, or blend in another style: take this brief to Mix styles.

04

Where it comes from, and what it’s close to

Before it

The style it grew out of, and the styles it borrowed from.

Nothing earlier is recorded: in the atlas it is a starting point.

This styleIslamic Geometric & Calligraphic Traditionc. 690–present · Middle East & North Africa, South Asia, Southern Europe

After it

The styles that grew out of it.

Alike in its design choices

Styles that make many of the same choices, related or not, besides those above.

05

Real works

Artefacts in museums, libraries and archives that show the style, linked at their source.

06

Sources

  1. Eric Broug, Islamic Geometric Design (Thames & Hudson, 2013)
  2. Sheila S. Blair, Islamic Calligraphy (Edinburgh University Press, 2006)
  3. Peter J. Lu & Paul J. Steinhardt, 'Decagonal and Quasi-Crystalline Tilings in Medieval Islamic Architecture', Science 315 (2007)

How Stylogeny researches and checks a style: where the facts come from.