Little Details

Well, the Beauty Queen set is inching closer to finished.  In a minute I'll head out once more in my paintin' pants (a pair of jeans so stiff with paint they stand on their own) to do touch-up painting on the set.

But, on the way, I need to do some errands to:

1)  The copy place, for an enlargement of an Irish newspaper header page, to top my stacks of Dallas Morning Newses with.  (Even onstage newspapers get costumes.)
2)  The dollar store, for cheap mats-of-plastic-foliage to put in rain troughs to "tune" the sound of falling water into a proper "rain" sound instead of the present water-on-water splash that's more like "pee."
3)  Also more moss - to make more fake "peat" for this Irish fire.
4)  The art/craft store, for spray wood-stain to "age" my '50s fabric sink-skirt, which is looking too pale under the stage lights, plus, if I can find any, fake spider webs left over from Halloween to show that these characters don't dust much.
5)  My grocery store, for plastic "butcher-block" stickem paper for a kitchen counter top and also a mouse trap to put under the refrigerator.

The audience notices details...

public domain image courtesy of reusableart.com

Fabric Shopping

Fabric shopping is one of the unexpected joys of set design.

Unexpected by me, anyway.  As an architect I'm comfortable with selecting building materials - brick, stone, wood etc. - even if in theater these materials are, like as not, merely painted imitations of the real thing.  Since most sets turn out to be of interior rooms, there are interior finishes to pick too.  Architects often choose carpet, but many hand off carpet selection and certainly "soft" furnishings to interior designers or even to clients.

Not in theater.  If it's physically on stage and neither worn by nor carried by an actor, then the scenic designer chose it.  Or at least okayed it.

Which turns out to be kinda fun.

Fabrics!  The colors, textures, the drape and weight and translucency!  Fabrics are fascinating.

Dallas is luckily big enough to support a lively collection of fabric stores and warehouses.  There are the big chain sewing/fabric stores like Hancock's or JoAnn's.  Retail prices are high for theater budgets, but these  stores have frequent sales.  Remnants sometimes.  Retail fabric stores that specialize in upholstery, curtain, and decorating fabrics, however, are mostly too expensive even with sales, but there are great cut-price fabric stores along Harry Hines.

The most famous of these discount warehouses is Golden d'Or with its legendary Bargain Room.   (Half off of already discount prices!)   I enjoy visiting Golden d'Or - in part because it's such a hidden I-know-the-secret-door sort of place - but my favorite and luckiest store is Wherehouse Fabrics just up the street.  It's organization is more slap-dash, tables heaped with fabric rolls, but prices start at $1.50 a yard.  Can't beat that!  Best Fabrics next door has a great decorating fabric selection at good prices... but I have more luck at Wherehouse.

Believed public domain

The other day I had luck for an upcoming show.  If not quite the silver-blue brocade I was looking for, which was 22 $/yd even at a discount, then my find is a very good substitute at 2.50 $/yd.  Seven yards?  That's a savings of almost $140 - a substantial fraction of this entire set budget.

Fun With Hardware Stores

Yesterday's running around included trips to several building supply places looking for switches and dials to use in the control booth of Frequency of Death.  Hardware stores are fun!  I came home with lots of galvanized "rough" electrical boxes and switch plates and white, not ivory, switches.

Thrift stores (also fun) were my other searching grounds - this time for silver(ish) photo frames.  In a black & white show, it's silver that you need.  I'm actually a little worried that some of the silver I found is a little "off," a little too warm and golden in tone; I may have to spray paint them more silver.

Believed public domain photo messed with.

Trying to avoid all color and tinting?  To find true black, white, or especially gray?  Very difficult.  Look at the world around you.  That black?  Tinted navy blue.  That white?  The faintest possible pink.  That silver?  Slightly, slightly brassy.

Set Designer's Day - The Hunt

A big part of some shows is The Hunt - the search for the right furniture or architectural details.  If the play is set in a historic period, ordinary contemporary doors or furniture just won't work - not as-is - so you have to find real or seeming antique styles for... everything.  This hunt is complicated by the limits of a theatrical budget.

For In the Other Room, we need to suggest the late 1800s.  So the whole design team is huntin'; yesterday the builders and I went to the local Habitat for Humanity resale shop, the Restore - a fantastic resource! - where new and used building supplies are sold for less than retail prices.

Middling success.  We found great new, but old-fashioned, doors - but they still cost too much, so we decided on plain flat-slab doors for only $5 each, to which we'll add molding to suggest two-panel doors.  We found inexpensive brass and china handles to use in building the machine.  But no luck on a period light fixture.  (I'll go back to see if anything new comes in next week.)

Afterwards I hit thrift shops and found 2/3 of the weather vane I'm going to cobble together; I still need a metal bird.  More thrift stores today!  When possible, it's good to shop first at thrift stores that support non-profit charities: for one thing, they have the odd, used, random things a theater set needs, for another, your theater's money is used to support another non-profit and a worthy cause.

Oh!  And shop with a car or truck that can carry your finds.  We almost had to strap those doors on a car roof, but managed to cram them (mostly) into another vehicle, tied in place with computer cable!

Shopping

One of the guilty pleasures of the set designer/set dresser job is that you get to go shopping (with other people's money!) for stuff to go on your set.

Yesterday was a big shopping day.  I hit at least, um, eight stores plus the printing place.  It would have been more, but my favorite antique place was locked up with a note on the gate... while through the chain-link I could see - but not touch - exactly the right table base.  Tempted to climb the fence.  Hey, I'd have left a note!

On the Boeing Boeing set there's a bench that's become the main thing the audience stares at -  it needs to be cool.  It also needs to be sturdy since this is a farce.  Finding this bench is proving tough.  The best choice available may be a concrete bench... which has a good "look" but is a bit more expensive than I'd like (the thrill of spending other folk's money is dissipated when you realize you ought not to squander it, sigh), and is a LOT heavier than I want to tote.  So, more research today.