Two designers and an associate, working out of Bermondsey. We do our own drafting and our own focus.
LANTERN is a lighting design practice working in theatre, opera, dance and occasionally in rooms that have no performers in them at all. Two designers, one associate, and a workspace in Bermondsey that exists mainly to hold the drafting machine and the model box.
We do our own drafting and our own focus. That is not a point of principle so much as a practical one: the person who guessed at an angle on paper should be the person standing under it at two in the morning finding out whether the guess was any good.
We build cues in the room, with the director, at the pace of the scene. Never from a plan worked out in advance, and never faster than the actors can be watched.
The script or the score, the ground plan, and a conversation about what the room is being asked to do. Dates and budget matter but they are not the first question.
We do not take work where the tech is under three days, and we do not design remotely. Both of those have been tested and both of them produce work we would rather not have our name on.
That is genuinely enough to start a conversation. Dates and budget help, but they are not the first question — the first question is what the room is being asked to do.