University Theatre's Spring Awakening (2025)

Directed/Co-choreographed by Erica Berman
Co-choreographed by Mari Bass
Music Direction by Kevin Blakeslee
Scenic Design by Brandon Wardell
Costume Design by Nora Wondra
Lighting Design by Leo Wang
Sound Design by Joshua Nguyen
Technical Direction by Rob Wagner
Properties Director is Isabel Osterhus
Stage Manager is Lucy Cowen
Scenic Charge Artist is Juliana Gessner

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Floor Treatment

The floor was painted to be variegated grey floorboards with amber accents throughout and a vignette around the edges. The process was as follows:

1. Slight grey base in PPG Breakthru that would both stick to the previous layers painted on the stage floor, and to serve as a satiny surface for the glaze to glide across
2. Glaze of light grey floorboards in varying opacities done with a 7" lay-in brush
3. Glaze of a darker grey on select floorboards to increase contrast
4. Amber (thinned burnt sienna) accents on select floorboards
5. Spatter and drag texture across the entire stage and darker at the edges
6. Black lines done with a lining stick and scenic fitch on a pole, purposefully uneven in places to sell the barn wood texture
7. 50/50 satin/matte polyurethane sealer

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Dry-brush woodgrain

The majority of the set was a white bleached barn wood texture with streaks of amber accenting the world. I sampled various dry-brush woodgrain techniques before settling on a simple 2-color grain on a very slightly grey base and adding a wash of burnt sienna for the amber accents once planks were installed in the space. It ended up being akin to an assembly line, with students processing boards quickly and setting them out to dry.