 The choice of Glasgow as European Capital of Culture for 1990 took Edinburgh by surprise and stimulated it to rebrand itself as a city of science, building on the success of a series of big urban developments led by its Economic Development Department.A senior member of the development team, Ian Wall, proposed that Edinburgh should highlight its new image by complementing its world-famous autumn arts festival with a new type of spring event for which he coined the phrase 'science festival'.Reaction was mixed, with some organisations doubting whether science could be packaged in an arts format.