Visiting Bahá’í Holy Places/International Archives Building

Visiting Bahá’í Holy Places by Bahá’í World Centre

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[Page 31]

International Archives Building

“The design of the international Bahá’í Archives, the first stately Edifice destined to usher in the establishment of the World Administrative Centre of the Faith on Mt. Carmel—the Ark referred to by Bahá’u’lláh in the closing passages of His Tablet of Carmel—has been completed. . . .” ⁵³ (Shoghi Effendi)

“As early as 1952, on the eve of the launching of the Guardian’s Ten Year Plan of Teaching and Consolidation, which later became known as the ‘World Crusade,’ he announced to the Bahá’ís, on October 8th, that one of the World Centre’s goals would be the ‘construction of the International Bahá’í Archives in the neighbourhood of the Báb’s Sepulchre.’ He later explained that this major undertaking . . . would ‘serve as the permanent and befitting repository for the priceless and numerous relics associated with the Twin Founders of the Faith, with the Perfect Exemplar of its teachings and with its heroes, saints and martyrs.’ . . . [Page 32] “At Naw-Rúz, 1955, the Guardian was able to ‘joyfully announce’ to the Bahá’í world ‘the commencement of the excavation for the foundation of the International Archives heralding the rise of the first edifice destined to inaugurate the establishment of the seat of the World Bahá’í Administrative Order in the Holy Land.’ . . .

“. . . the Parthenon . . . was to serve as a pattern for his building. [However] . . . the capitals were to be of the Ionic and not the Doric order, and above the main entrance, in the tympanum, there was to be a sunburst with the Greatest Name. . . .

“Shoghi Effendi said he wanted [the roof] to be green, the lovely green of verdigris on copper. . . . The same firm, in Utrecht, Holland, which had made the golden tiles for the dome of the Báb’s Shrine was engaged to produce the more than 7,000 ridged tiles required for the roof. . . .

“The Archives Building stands 12 metres high and is 14 metres wide and 32 metres long, has 50 columns and 2 pilasters over 7 metres high and is built throughout of a marble known as Chiampo Paglierino, a very pale beige in colour. This is the same stone, from the Chiampo quarries between Vicenza and Verona, of which the Shrine of the Báb is built. . . .

“In April, 1957, he [the Guardian] was able to inform us that the exterior of the International Archives Building was completed and the roof in place, ‘the whole contributing to an unprecedented degree, through its colourfulness, its classic style and graceful proportions, and in conjunction with the stately, golden-crowned Mausoleum rising beyond it, to the unfolding glory of the central institutions of a World Faith nestling in the heart of God’s holy mountain.’” ⁵⁴ (Amatu’l-Bahá Rúḥíyyih Khánum)