Scenic design education

Teaching Philosophy

Mentorship, professional practice, adaptable design pedagogy, and a studio culture where rigor and access strengthen one another.

I teach students to see design as a way of thinking: a practice that connects story, people, material, technology, and the realities of making work together.

The classroom should prepare a student for more than one kind of future. That means preserving the hand skills, spatial judgment, historical awareness, and collaborative habits that ground theatrical design while also making room for the tools and industries reshaping creative practice.

Download the teaching statement

01 · Mentorship + Adaptability

Preparing students for the landscape they are actually entering.

My role is less about delivering fixed answers and more about mentoring students toward skill, confidence, and adaptability from day one. Theatre remains the foundation, but the work also points toward film, television, events, themed entertainment, and the wider creative industries where design thinking can travel.

Students standing beside a scenic design presentation monitor — Student presentation and design conversation

02 · Tradition + Innovation

Craft gives technology somewhere meaningful to go.

I teach spatial awareness, material comprehension, hand process, and design aesthetics alongside Vectorworks, Twinmotion, and AI-driven tools. The goal is not novelty for its own sake. The goal is a toolkit that never becomes the limiting factor of a student's imagination.

Student costume and scenic artwork displayed on a classroom wall — Design process work across disciplines

03 · Access + Rigor

Different paths into the work can still lead to exacting standards.

Students learn differently, so the classroom has to offer more than one door into complex material. Supplemental videos, tactile-digital assignments, critique, and scaffolded checkpoints reduce friction without lowering expectations. Accessibility makes room for better design choices.

Students drawing around a studio table — Drawing and observation in the studio

04 · Classroom → Laboratory

A studio culture where experimentation has a safety net.

I think of teaching as research in public. The classroom is where current industry practice, emerging tools, and student curiosity can be tested critically. A strong studio culture gives students space to collaborate, self-advocate, revise, and take creative risks—with support around them.