Molla Bey began the mosque, and his son Haxhi Ethem Bey finished it. The body gives construction as 1791 or 1794 to 1819 or 1821, while the infobox gives about 1794 to 1821. The article names no architect, calls the style Ottoman and gives no dimensions or materials.
The square prayer hall is entered from the north through a portico, under a semi-spherical dome with no windows, and there is one minaret. The mosque forms a complex with the Clock Tower of Tirana. Frescoes of trees, waterfalls and bridges cover the interior and the portico, mostly imaginary scenes, and a chronogram compares the mosque to Hagia Sophia.
The mosque was closed under Enver Hoxha's communist government, then declared a historical monument and restored in the late 1960s and early 1970s. On January 18, 1991, about 10,000 people entered carrying flags, despite opposition from communist authorities. Daily tours run except during prayers.
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