In February 2010, in the beautiful setting of Wiston House, nestled at the foot of the hilly South Downs in Sussex, UK, The Company of Biologists, the not-for-profit organisation that publishes Development, held the inaugural meeting of their new workshop series dedicated to biological research (for more information on these meetings, please go to http://workshops.biologists.com/). The meeting was titled 'Neural Stem Cells in Development and Disease', and was organised by Kate Storey, Professor of Neural Development at the College of Life Sciences of the University of Dundee, and Silvia Marino, Professor of Neuropathology at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry. They were also assisted by the workshop chairman, François Guillemot, Programme Leader of the Division of Molecular Neurobiology at the National Institute for Medical Research in London. The scientific scope and themes of this workshop are covered in more detail in a meeting review published in this issue (see p. 1933) but, to get a glimpse behind the scenes, we talked to Kate Storey and Silvia Marino and asked them about the organisation of the 'Neural Stem Cells in Development and Disease' workshop.