Quaid-i-Azam University, founded in 1965 as the federal university of the new capital, occupies a 700-hectare campus on the lower slopes of the Margalla Hills east of central Islamabad. It is the most highly ranked research university in Pakistan and a useful set piece of 1960s modernist campus planning — open courtyards, brutalist concrete halls, a long axial spine of academic buildings.
The campus is open and pleasant to walk through during the day; the central library and the science blocks are the most distinctive buildings. The university is the easiest non-tourist setting in Islamabad in which to meet young Pakistanis.