Alison Chitty – the public sketch

Alison Chitty is one of the key British Theatre Designers working across the last decades of the twentieth century and the first two decades of the twenty-first. Her influence is widespread yet subtle in terms of the impact of her design work for theatre productions and her influence upon subsequent generations of theatre designers. She was awarded an OBE in 2004 (Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) and in 2009 elected as a Royal Designer for Industry.1 She has been recognized for her exemplary design work with two Olivier awards in 2001 and 20072 and a Young Vic award in 2008.3 She has worked as a theatre designer for all of her professional life, mainly in the subsidized theatre such as the Royal National Theatre (RNT) rather than commercially for the West End. Chitty’s designs are most recognizable through her distinctive drawings and sketches than for a specific style of work, as her designs for productions range broadly from gritty new pieces for stage or screen (Secrets and Lies, Leigh 1996) to classic Shakespeare productions and most recently new operas for the Royal Opera House (Sir Harrison Birtwistle, Sir Michael Tippett).