“While we cannot present an in-depth analysis right now, I think we can begin by acknowledging that, more or less everywhere in the Ummah, Muslims and others are asking themselves the right questions and are developing positive answers about their built environment: Are we building for the future in a culturally empathetic way? Do we now own and are we marshalling the necessary creative resources - ranging from new schools of architecture to new data bases, through which the architectural community can share its questions and answers, its problems and its successes? This in itself is a magnificent change from 1977, when such simple but essential questions were generally not being asked, or had only negative answers.”

–His Highness the Aga Khan speaking at the Aga Khan Award for Architecture Presentation Ceremony, Kuala Lumpur, 4 September 2007