The Sixth Hutton Symposium on the Origin of Granites and Related Rocks was held on July 2–6, 2007 at the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa, founded on granite, nestled at the feet of towering mountains and fringed by the rolling winelands of the Western Cape. This Special Issue opens with Master’s historical account of how the Cape granites influenced 18th and early 19th century thinking on the origins of these rocks. The fascinating fact is that the granites of the Western Cape were apparently the first intrusive granites recognised outside Britain. The balance of the volume contains a collection of research papers derived from the meeting and illustrates some of the important directions in which granite research may be evolving. One of the characteristics of the papers and talks presented at the meeting was that there seemed to be some shift in interest, away from the crust as a source of granitic magmas and towards mantle rocks that have been metasomatised by subduction-zone fluids or melts. Nevertheless, the crust still holds pride of place as the cradle of granite genesis.