Design Show 2026

Seth Brown (he/him) is a lighting designer based in New York City. Originally from Kansas City, MO, Seth holds a BFA from Missouri State University, is an alumnus of the Juilliard Professional Apprentice Program and has an MFA from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Seth started design early, taking flashlights and tissue paper to create a stage while he played Guitar Hero 3 for his mom. His deep love for science fiction and fantasy helped to ingrain an intense focus on world building and storytelling. His artistic career took off when he moved from Kansas City to New York City and began collaborating with other creatives on wide ranging projects across the city. Outside of theater, Seth can be found writing novels in Prospect Park, riding the cyclone at Coney Island, or playing yet another Baulders Gate 3 campaign.

Benjamin Burton (he/him) is a New York City-based costume designer with a deep curiosity for the world. He holds an MFA in Costume Design from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and is a proud union member of United Scenic Artists Local 829. Benjamin's love of storytelling began with the imaginary worlds he created to play make-believe games with his brothers in the Ethiopian village where they grew up. His interest in textiles developed in the 3rd grade when he taught himself to knit from a wikiHow article. Discovering costume design allowed Benjamin to merge his passion for story and for craft, and he has never looked back. Benjamin often employs myth and ritual in his work, and he embraces the awesome and the absurd with equal enthusiasm. Outside the studio, Benjamin enjoys writing, bargain-hunting, and running in Riverbank State Park.

Farideh Didehvar is a Scenic Designer from Mashhad, Iran, currently based in NYC. She gained her bachelor’s degree in English Language and Literature from Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, where she learned the art of story telling. She then pursued her higher education in Performance Making at Goldsmiths, University of London, where she got to explore spatial design and constructing narratives through space, designing installations and writing her dissertation on Installation Art as a Means to Protest. She holds her MFA degree in Scenic Design from NYU Tisch, School of the Arts.

Dani Jeannette Draper (she/her) is a New York City based lighting designer originally from Santa Barbara, California. Dani’s passion for lighting comes from her background in dance and performance art. Her work has taken her around the globe to theater festivals in North Macedonia, Armenia, and Georgia. Some of Dani’s previous credits include Angels In America Millennium Approaches (Tony Kushner), Top Girls (Caryl Churchill), and Trouble In Paradise (Luz Lorenzana Twigg). Dani holds an MFA from NYU Tisch School of the Arts and a BA in Theater Arts from Westmont College.

Rodri Hernandez Martinez is an incredibly hot and beautiful scenographer and artist from Cancun and Mexico City working in different mediums including performance art, theatre, opera, and dance using design elements as dramaturgy. They love working on projects that display the nuances of systems like immigration, gender and race with a sense of mischief, subversion, and other big words. They hold an M.F.A. in Design for Stage and Film from NYU Tisch and a B.F.A. in Theatre Production Arts from Ithaca College. Previous works include: SOMETHING BORROWED, SOMETHING GREEN commissioned performance piece at Park Ave. Armory, NYC. Scenic and Costume designer for I’M GONNA MARY YOU TOBEY MAGUIRE at The Cell, NYC & Southwark Playhouse, London.

Aafini Kamal is an Indonesian scenic and production designer based in New York City. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Architecture and an MFA in Production Design from NYU Tisch. Her love for making began in her mother’s home-based garment production studio, where she grew up surrounded by pattern makers, seamstresses, and artisans specializing in embroidery and beadwork. This early exposure to hands-on creation shaped her instinct for craft, material, and detail. She maintains a tactile approach to design through model making and continues to explore new crafts, including crochet, beading, and scenic painting. Aafini is drawn to telling diverse, layered stories through her work, with a focus on uncovering shared humanity across different worlds. Grounded in an early interest in mathematics and geometry, she uses spatial logic to shape environments while embracing materiality, cultural context, and lived history.

Ruomeng Li is a scenic and production designer based in New York City. She holds a Bachelor’s degree from the Shanghai Theatre Academy, an MA in Theatre Production and Design from the University of the Arts London, and an MFA in Production Design from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. She is passionate about bringing stories to life through a wide range of mediums, including theatre, opera, dance, as well as painting and sculpture. Each time words rise from the page and take on color and form—evoking joy and sorrow—it deepens her belief that theatre expands our ability to perceive life, to understand others, and to experience the world more fully. She finds inspiration in the details of everyday life and value all we feel, which continually fuels her creative work. She is obsessed with making things—whether it’s a miniature world for a snow globe, a bookstand crafted from reclaimed wood, or a strawberry rhubarb pie to brighten a summer day—because the act of making grounds her in the present, sharpens intention, and transforms abstract ideas into shared, tangible truths. Recently, she has been captivated by the paintings of Camille Pissarro and Cyberpunk: Edgerunners.

Genevieve McCormick (they/ them) is a New York based Costume Designer and native North Carolinian. They hold a BFA in Painting and Drawing with a minor in Theater Production with an emphasis in Costume Design from East Carolina University and an MFA in Costume Design from NYU Tisch. Their work as an artist is heavily influenced by nature, exploring a character’s psychological state, exposing violence through storytelling, and the sleep paralysis demon in their bedroom corner. Genevieve’s passion for costuming began when their grandmother taught them how to sew around the age of 7 and they began creating their own clothing and costumes from thrifted bedsheets and curtains. As a classically trained painter, finding costume design allowed Genevieve to merge both their passion for creating and sewing into a more expansive form of storytelling. When not found painting on their bedroom floor covered in oil paint, Genevieve can be found reading books typically in the Horror or Fantasy genre, though recently Sci-Fi books have managed to make it into the reading rotation, creating textiles through various techniques, or playing an ongoing Dungeons and Dragons campaign.

Wyatt Moniz is a designer and visual artist creating unconventional storytelling devices using light, shadow, sculpture, and projected image for live experiences including theater, dance, immersive environments, and kinetic sculpture. Recent credits include a solo exhibition at Lincoln Center’s David Geffen Hall titled The Digital Sundial (Kinetic sculpture/Projection Design), Unblinking Eye at Theater Lab (Lighting), Cyrano de Bergerac at the African Grove Theater (Lighting), Work Week a film by Wyatt Moniz, What Happens to Brown Girls… at Mabou Mines (Lighting), Sisters by Water at Harlem Stage (Projections), The Baptism film by Carl Hancock Rux & Carrie Mae Weems at Mabou Mines (Lighting), The Vicksburg Project at Harlem Stage (Projections.) NYU Lighting Designer, Class of 2026.

Alex is a Scenic & Production Designer from New York. He was born in the Dominican Republic and grew up in Brooklyn. He’s also a Local 829 Scenic Artist and a Documentary Filmmaker. He’s a recipient of the Chautauqua Theater Scenic Design Fellowship and the Bronx Documentary Films Fellowship. Alex has a background in Photo and a love for analog photography.

Lucas O’Brien is a New York City-based costume designer and stylist. He holds an MFA in Costume Design from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. Lucas is adopted from Colombia and shares a wonderful multi-ethnic family from Boston, MA. His love for performance, story-telling, and art is central to his personal and creative identity. Lucas has always loved fashion and clothing. As a kid he learned to sew as the only male kid at a senior quilting guild and his favorite television programs are Project Runway and Antiques Roadshow. His studies and professional career have taken him from assisting designers like Paul Tazewell, on exotic photo shoots with Tonne Goodman, and most recently as a Market Editor for Vogue Magazine. Outside the studio, Lucas enjoys cooking, photography, collecting Barbie, and seeing movies. Lucas also loves to go back to Massachusetts to be with family whenever he can.

Steven is a multidisciplinary theatre maker who holds a BFA in Theatre Studies (Acting and Directing) from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX and an MFA in Costume Design from NYU Tisch Design for Stage and Film. As a collaborator, his acting background provides him deep emotional access to the characters journey and his directing background makes him a curious creator on all fronts. As a costume designer, he treasures the moments in the fitting room mirror when an actor locks eyes with their character for the first time. His favorite place on earth is the rehearsal room! Outside of the theatre, he nurses a steady addiction to The Real Housewives.

Claudia is an Australian Costume and set designer who seeks to fulfill designs in creative and innovative ways, through research and imagination in order to seamlessly transport audiences to new places and deeper into storytelling. She strives to make transitions for audiences through costumes and sets that are engaging and collaborative. She grew up on a sheep and cattle farm in central NSW where she enjoyed horse riding and animal care as well as learning to sew from her mother and grandmother. She loves travelling, reading and learning about places, people and things. She received an MFA in Design for Stage and Film from NYU Tisch School of the Arts ‘26 and a Bachelor Degree in Creative Industries (Acting and Performance Design) at Charles Sturt University Wagga Wagga.

Devon is a scenic designer from Korea, currently based in Brooklyn, New York. With background studies of architecture design and music production, Devon is interested in experimenting and exploring unique visual aesthetics, aspiring to become a set designer of all live performances. Devon holds his MFA in Scenic Design from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.

Brandon Washington is a lighting designer who works in theatre, dance, ballet and opera. Brandon keeps his process tactile by drawing out a show's rhythm and marking emotional beats that influence his ideas about visual and graphic composition from the very beginning. Words from both the text and other collaborators are the basis of his design process. Past lighting design credits include: An Enemy of the People (New York University – Graduate Acting), A Conversation with the Brat (Second Avenue Dance Company), Jenn Freeman’s The Soloist (Idaho Dance Theatre), Middle Name (Second Avenue Dance Company), A Pair of Fools (Columbia University), Fugue/State (New York University – Graduate Acting), All Is Calm (Boise Contemporary Theater), Cinderella (Ballet Idaho), As One (Opera Idaho). Resident Lighting Designer for the Second Avenue Dance Company.