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Von Canon Library Von Canon Library

Resource Guide:
Production Design and Stagecraft

Websites and Digital Archives

Subject Headings

Subject headings are selected terms to represent a topic. Searching subject headings in the library catalog will bring the most complete list of results. Below are some example subject headings. More subject headings can be located in the red books at the reference desk.

  • Theatre
  • Theatres–Stage-setting and scenery
  • Set Designers
  • Stage Machinery
  • Stage Lighting
  • Costume
  • Stage Management
  • Stage Props

Research Databases

The following databases are specifically useful for your topic. You can search them individually on the databases page.

Online Journals

The following journals supply articles to the library’s databases. You can see if a specific journal supplies articles to our databases by searching the journal title on the library journal page.

  • American Theatre
  • Live Design (formerly Entertainment Design and Theatre Crafts)
  • New York Times
  • Stage Directions
  • Theatre Arts Journal Studies in Scenography and Performance

Print Materials at the Von Canon Library

Below are some selected materials in the library with their shelving locations. Browsing in the listed areas of the library will help you find more materials for your topic.

Title Call Number
Early American Rooms: A Consideration of the Changes in Style between the Arrival of the Mayflower and the Civil War in the Regions Originally Settled by the English and the DutchNK 2003 .K4
The Opulent Eye: Late Victorian and Edwardian Taste in Interior DesignNK 2043 .C66 1977
Illustrated theatre production guide PN 2085 .H64 2002
The theater props handbook: a comprehensive guide… PN 2091 .J231 2000
Designing and Drawing for the Theatre PN 2091 .P36 1995
Scenery : design and fabrication PN 2091 .S6 S73 2001
Developing and maintaining a design-tech portfolio : a guide for theatre PN 2091 .S8 J33 2006
The performing set : the broadway designs of William and Jean Eckart PN 2096 .E23 H37 2006

Sample Set Designers

  • Donald Oenslager
  • Robert Edmond Jones
  • Ming Cho Lee
  • Heidi Landesman
  • Tony Walton
  • John Napier
  • Robin Wagner
  • Boris Aronson
  • Lee Simonson
  • Adolph Appia
  • John Lee Beatty
  • Jo Mielziner
  • Josef Svoboda
  • Inigo Jones
  • Norman Bel Geddes
  • Oliver Smith
  • Mordecai Gorelik

Sample Lighting Designers

  • Tharon Musser
  • James Moody
  • Steele Mckae
  • Jennifer Tipton
  • Jules Fisher
  • Tom Skelton
  • Richard Pilbrow
  • Neil Jampolis
  • David Hersey
  • Ken Billington

Sample Costume Designers

  • Desmond Heely
  • Erte
  • Theoni V. Aldriedge
  • Patricia Zipprodt
  • Julie Taymor
  • Leon Bakst
  • William Ivey Long
  • Catherine Zubber
  • Bob Mackie