The Department of Drama’s Production & Design Studio recently held a ribbon cutting ceremony for its new Costume Lab. Made possible by a generous gift from the “Kitty Galliher-Leech Fund,” the lab will, among other purposes, support costume curriculum, both within the P&D studio and across Tisch Drama’s Intro to Theatre Production program.
Kitty Leech was a longtime faculty member who left a deep legacy in the Drama Department and its productions. She was instrumental in the creation of the Tech Track (now Production & Design) Studio. With her colleague Greg Barnes, Kitty designed and built costumes for more than 150 Drama Department productions. She taught costume design, figure drawing and costume history courses, mentored hundreds of costume designers for over twenty-five years, and was famous for never showing up to class without snacks and a witty retort.
Following Kitty’s untimely death, her family worked with NYU to establish a fund to support costume training in the department. This fund underwrote the conversion of a former acting studio into the new Costume Lab, thus enabling Kitty’s legacy to live on and further support the next generations of costume students.
Said Erin Black, who heads Costume Design for P&D: “Students have already been utilizing the space for exciting class work during studio hours and as a workshop for student generated costume work to support their collaboration with peers on Student Works and Playwrights Horizons Theater School directing projects."
