'Chini-khana' translates as 'porcelain house.' A chini-khana is a "space with recessed niches designed specifically for the display of precious vessels."2
The stylized flower form of the chini-khana niches on the baradari's porch is akin to the Timurid eslimi, stylized floral, kangura that runs along the top of the buildings, the same form that is outlined by the cusped arches, the floral decoration on the baluster bases, and the raised stylized flower on Humayun's cenotaph.
1. Margaret S. Graves and Benoît Junod eds., Treasures of the Aga Khan Museum: Architecture in Islamic Arts (Geneva: Aga Khan Trust for Culture, 2011), 348.
2. ibid, 348.
A Vase in a Chini-khana Wall Niche
A Chini-khana Wall
Similar stylized flower shapes like that of the chini-khana niches are a common ornamentation style of Timurid architecture and can be found elsewhere around Humayun's Garden Tomb.
Chida-Razvi, Mehreen. "From Function to Form: Chinikhana in Safavid and Mughal Architecture." South Asian Studies 35, no. 1 (2009): 82-106.
Rahnama, Hamed. Eslimi: Persian Curves (Draw Easy Book 2). Persian Garden, 2020. Kindle.
Wescoat, J.L. Jr. "Mughal Gardens: History, Geography, and Culture." In Heritage of the Mughal World, edited by Philip Jodidio, 97-111. Munich: Prestel, 2015.
—. "Waterworks and Landscape Design in the Mahtab Bagh." In The Moonlight Garden: New Discoveries at the Taj Mahal, edited by Elizabeth B. Moynihan, 59-78. Washington, D.C.: Arthur M. Sackler Gallery; Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2000.
Get Daily Art. "Ladies Celebrating Diwali."
