Liverpool Muslim Institute

The Liverpool Muslim Institute stands in a three-storey terrace at 8 Brougham Terrace, West Derby Road. Built around 1830, the terrace is of brick with stone dressings and a slate roof. Its six bays rise to a shallow parapet above sashed windows. The building once housed Liverpool’s Register Office after the mosque closed in 1908. Numbers 11 and 12 were demolished to make way for a cinema, leaving only 8–10 of the original terrace. The institute was founded in 1887 by Abdullah Quilliam, born William Henry Quilliam in Liverpool. With his first convert, Mrs Elizabeth Cates, he began meetings at the Temperance Hall before buying 8 Brougham Terrace. By 1891 the Liverpool Mosque and Muslim Institute was established, likely the first recorded mosque in the United Kingdom. The institute published The Crescent weekly and The Islamic World monthly, reaching readers in twenty countries. Teachers such as Maulavi Barkatullah and barrister Abdul Kadir Khan worked alongside professors Nasrullah Warren and Haschem Wilde. Visitors find the restored mosque on the ground floor, reached through the terrace’s original entrance. The rear extension still serves as the prayer hall, its layout unchanged since 1891. Above, rooms hold archives of The Crescent and early Islamic publications. The building’s Grade II* listing recognises its historic importance. Outside, West Derby Road carries the same tram route that once passed the terrace in Quilliam’s time.