Built with the advice of two of Fathy's leading students, a reconstructed adobe farmhouse near Riyadh is a unique synthesis of tradition and modernity. Its owner, HRH Prince Sultan ibn Salman, discusses with Aramco World his hopes that al-'Udhaibat will inspire "a generation that needs its heritage."

In excerpts from an unpublished 1981 conversation, Fathy talks about what inspires his love of old Cairo, and the relationships among architecture, music, society and the human soul.

For much of his 50-year career, Hassan Fathy's articulate belief in indigenous motifs, natural thermodynamics, local materials and peasant self-help made him an outcast. Now, a decade after his death, he is acknowledged internationally as a pioneer and a force of conscience.

The towns along the US-Mexico border share their climate, their insecure economies and their use of adobe with the Nile villages to which Fathy was committed. Bringing that commitment to America, former Fathy assistant Simone Swan also brought Nubian vaulting to present a new option in environmentally sound, low-cost housing for the region.

For all their inspirational power, only a few of Fathy's principles have been widely accepted. Aramco World and the University of Texas at Austin brought together three experts to explore their understandings of Fathy's contradictions and his profound, enduring challenges to our future.

In what may be the least-publicized relief effort of the Kosovo crisis, Saudi Arabia and seven other Arab countries mobilized public and private resources to support more than a quarter of the Kosovars who found refuge in Albania. In July, Arab agencies began accompanying refugees back into Kosovo to help them rebuild.