Born in Pakistan, Prof Gulzar Haidar was a Fulbright Scholar and received his master's, bachelor's and doctorate degrees in architecture from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana. Since the early 1980s he has been deeply involved with issues of architecture and culture with special focus on architecture as a mirror for Muslim self-image in the West. He designed and built four major mosques in North America and has widely written about the need for Abrahamic values shared by Judaism, Christianity and Islam toward shaping the environment and achieving peace. In the early 1980s, following a sabbatical in Saudi Arabia, Haider turned his attention to issues of "modernity and tradition" in the middle and far east. In 1988, he was appointed as a member of the prestigious International Commission for the Preservation of Islamic Cultural Heritage. He completed his BS in Engineering from Punjab University, Lahore, in 1958, his MS in Engineering (1962), BA in Architecture (1968) and PhD (1969) from the University of Illinois, USA. He served as head of the School of Architecture, University of Carleton, Canada, from 2000-2004