Abstract Most papers in this special issue were presented at the 13th International Workshop on Seismic Anisotropy (13IWSA) held in Winter Park, Colorado, U.S.A. on 10–15 August 2008. The organizing committee included Ilya Tsvankin and Ken Larner of the Center for Wave Phenomena at Colorado School of Mines and James Gaiser and Edward Jenner of ION/GXT Imaging Solutions. This workshop continued the great tradition of biennial gatherings of anisotropists, which dates to the early 1980s. The previous workshops, attended by scientists from all over the world, are widely credited with helping to move anisotropy to the forefront of applied seismology. In Winter Park, more than 70 geophysicists from industry and academia discussed both the theoretical aspects of anisotropy and the application of anisotropic processing/inversion methods to seismic exploration and reservoir monitoring.