Ever wondered what it’s like to design for us? Here’s a breakdown to help you get a better idea of what this festival looks like!

Before the 48 hours officially start, you’ll come to the theater Friday night for a party! There’s bingo to get to know everyone, then we go over some agenda items (like important people’s contact info) for the festival, and do a meet and greet!

 Designers show up at the theater in the morning around 7:50 AM. Make sure you have all your stuff for the day, especially a packed lunch and a water bottle!

Once you get there, you’ll meet with your fellow designers and each of you will get assigned to one of 7 freshly-written shows. You’ll read the script and make notes of potential costumes, props, and set pieces the show might call for.

Then, find your director and ask them about their vision for the show. The design of the show is, of course, up to you, but this is a good time to make sure you’re on the same page about that and pick their brain for any extra ideas.

Around 8:30, once the actors get here, take a seat in the theater and watch the actors get randomly assigned to each play. Once that’s done, go meet with your directors and actors! This is a great time to take your actors’ clothing sizes and ask if they brought any clothing pieces that might work for your show.

Once everyone’s finished with that, meet up with the rest of your designers and go over every costume piece, prop, and set piece you are going to use in your show, as well as your plan for making, finding, or borrowing it. The head designer will make a shopping list of everything you can’t possibly find around the theater or borrow from anyone here, and will go shopping later in the morning.

Start assembling your costumes, finding/making props, and building set pieces! Make sure you have a game plan for the day so you stay on track. If there are any really important or unwieldy costumes or props, it’s nice to bring them to the rehearsal room so your cast can practice with them.

Around 10 or so check in with your show to see if they’ve made their final casting decisions. This is when you can really start finalizing costumes. After that, continue working on the design.

Around 12:00 is LUNCH!

From 12:30 on, you’ll be in the final push to get your show ready to perform. Your show will have tech between 1:00 and 5:30 (you’ll find out your show’s exact time of tech the morning of the festival), so the design needs to be mostly done before that. Once you’re done, move all your props to backstage.

When your show has tech, help them move all the props and costumes onstage. You won’t have to do this all by yourself for the real show, this is just your time to finalize where everything will be on the stage.

Around 5:30 is DINNER! This is provided.

At 6:00, everyone comes together for a short meeting.

After the meeting, the designers are no longer designers! They are now running crew, which means they take the props and set pieces on and offstage during the show. Running crew meets with the assistant stage manager to make the detailed plan about who’s going to bring on which items.

At 7:30, the first show begins! With the guidance of the stage manager, the running crew flawlessly completes their fantastic plan for getting props/sets on and offstage.

At 10:00, the second show begins! Again, the running crew does their amazing and wonderful plan.

After the second show, MAKE SURE you return all borrowed props and costumes, deconstruct any constructed set pieces, and recycle/throw away anything cardboard/non-salvageable. Then collect your Wall of Love notes and go home!

If you’re doing a second day, the next morning you’ll come back and do it all again!