In Conversation with Susannah Henry, Interim Programme Leader of BA Performance Design

We caught up with Susannah Henry, the course leader for our new programme BA Performance Design, launching in 2025. We talked through what students can expect during their studies, from collaboration and interdisciplinary practice, to building key external networks that will become the foundations of future backstage careers.   

What was your first experience within the performing arts? How did you know this was something that you wanted to pursue professionally?

My first experience with performing arts was taking ballet lessons and taking part in school plays, although I think my first experience of anything like ‘performance design’ was helping my teacher to create displays on the wall outside our classroom. I was also lucky and saw a lot of theatre as I was growing up, especially at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, which introduced me to a mixture of different kinds of performance.

I remember asking my Mum how an especially huge set had ‘got there’ and she explained that there were people who used art and design to make those decisions! I enjoyed Art and Design and English at school, so working as a performance designer felt like an intuitive fit for me. 

Can you tell us more about some of your career highlights, so far?

I have very much enjoyed being able to travel as a performance designer, with stints designing in Singapore and Hong Kong being particularly exciting.

It was a big moment for me to design C90 by Daniel Kitson at the Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh, having enjoyed so much theatre there as a member of the audience. C90 was a wonderful storytelling show, with a design I was proud of, which did a UK tour and eventually found its way to New York and Sydney, too.

There have been some very enjoyable projects from the perspective of collaboration, working as a designer in drama schools with actors in training, or working with small companies and inspiring directors and writers in regional theatres. I enjoyed making a show about early aviation at Bristol Old Vic and adapting Kafka for young audiences with Little Earthquake, who are based in Birmingham. These were both shows with lovely teams of people and a fun, creative process.

More recently, I have enjoyed speaking about solo design-led projects at the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space, which is an international gathering of performance designers and happens every four years. 

What is something about working in the industry that we wouldn’t know?

Depending on the starting point, you find the things you are going to love about a project through designing it. My sense is that early career practitioners worry if they don’t have an immediate connection to a play text or other kind of starting point, but I always think the process carries you towards the things you will love about the project. 

As the course leader of our new BA Performance Design programme, can you tell us what students can expect from your course?

This programme has been ‘designed’ by a performance designer, which means that it has been developed using insights gained through direct experience in training and practicing in the theatre industry. The programme has been structured to embrace the varied approaches and ambitions that sit within the scope of performance design – all designers are different, we have different strengths, make different choices about materials or the way we communicate our ideas. 

The programme at Guildhall has been designed to make space for a spectrum of approaches, while delivering strong training in the fundamental skills shared by performance designers. We have thought carefully about structuring the programme in a way that holds early-stage students securely as they develop new skills while giving students in their third year the freedom to explore the distinct kind of practitioner they wish to be. The programme is designed to nurture a lifelong relationship between the things that inspire creativity (seeing shows, exhibitions, going places) and professional practice. 

How can students stand out when applying to your course?

I think telling a clear story of their interests through the portfolio is important – including the projects of which you are most proud and which you feel confident and happy talking about. Communication is a big part of performance design practice, and so we will be looking for people who enjoy talking about their work and the things that they find inspiring. This does not mean you need to be an extrovert, but being enthusiastic about performance and the visual arts is essential. We are interested in seeing evidence of creative process as well as finished projects, so if you feel the process of a project tells a good story and you would like to share it with us, then we would love to see it.

An important part of the School’s ethos is internal and external collaboration, how will students on BA Performance Design experience this?

Good collaboration in performance design begins with a good atmosphere in the design studio - we encourage Performance Design students to build a studio community who encourage and support each other. With this as a strong foundation, you will collaborate with peers on other programmes at Guildhall - students in Production Arts and Digital Design for Performance, for example - alongside performers training in acting and music. Beyond this, you will collaborate on projects led by internal staff – many of whom are professionally active – and freelance practitioners who are brought in to lead projects at the school.

While performance design includes periods of working independently, collaboration is the main mode of working, so it is important to construct a programme that offers as many opportunities to collaborate as possible!

What advice would you give to students interested in studying production arts?

I would encourage anyone thinking of studying performance design to see as much as they can of performance and the visual arts – this kind of independent background research is critical to developing a deep and well-informed practice, which can draw on a range of inspirations. This might mean seeing shows in theatre spaces or exhibitions, but it could equally mean noticing the design and performance that is all around us: whether through street theatre or in interesting public spaces which propose particular ways of interacting with them. As a performance designer, it is interesting to consider how the everyday places you encounter might work as stages!

To find out more about BA Performance Design, save the date for our next Production Arts Open Day.