Üsküdar and the Princes’ Islands - Strolling Through Istanbul: The Classic Guide to the City - page 388

Its own courtyard is almost as pretty as that of the mosque itself and
is oddly irregular, having five domed bays to the south but only three
to the north. The dershane is in the centre of the west side in the axis
of the mosque though at an obtuse angle to it, and it projects over
the street below which passes under it through an archway. If one
leaves the medrese by the gate in the south side, one can walk round
the building and pass under this picturesque arch. At the next corner
beyond it stands the large hânkah, or dervish hospice, also highly
irregular in plan but quite as attractive as the other buildings. These
various irregularities are partly due to the alignment of pre-existing
streets and the varying level of the terrain, but were perhaps courted
by Sinan to give variety and liveliness to his design, for he could quite
easily have avoided them if he had chosen.
The mektep is across the street to the south of the mosque. Across
the street to the west of the mosque are the imaret, tabhane, dar-ül
hadis, dar-ül kurra and kervansaray, none of which are open to the
public. The hamam, which has been restored and is once again in use,
is two blocks west of the medrese and on the same street. One hopes
that all of the buildings of that Atik Valide külliye will be restored and
opened to the public, for it is certainly one of the half-dozen most
impressive monuments of Ottoman architecture not only in the city
but anywhere in the country.
ÇİNİLİ CAMİİ
The street to the east of Atik Valide leads after a walk of about
one kilometre to Çinili Camii, a small complex by another Valide
Sultan, Kösem, mother of Murat IV and the mad Ibrahim, built at
the beginning of the latter's reign in 1640. The mosque, in a pretty
garden filled with flowers and trees, is small and simple: a square
room covered by a dome, but it has both on the façade and in the
interior a revetment of tiles (hence its name, çinili = tiled) just after
the best period, but still quite fine, chiefly pale blue and turquoise
on a white ground. The mimber of white marble has its carving very
prettily picked out in gold, red and green, and its conical roof is tiled.
The porch of the mosque is a baroque addition, as is the minaret,
of which the şerefe has a corbel of very pretty folded-back acanthus