The 1994 Turku conference was clearly a landmark in interpreting research, first of all because of its emphasis on interpreting as an object of research. In fact, only one previous conference had done this, namely the 1977 conference in Venice (the 1986 conference in Trieste focussing on training issues). But the Turku conference was also special because, rather than taking the form of a “supermarket” of overlapping papers, it was organized as a series of consecutive sessions, which facilitated cohesion by allowing for on-going, interactive discussions throughout the conference. Thirdly, as the conference was so well attended (by more than 130 participants), it offered an interesting introduction to current ideas, disagreements, methods and activities in the field—as well as a presentation of most of the active people. As I remember leaving this conference with a feeling of inspiration and optimism about my own work, I was naturally eager to read its proceedings when they finally arrived in 1997.