Ordinary Days

Set & Costume Design

Set in New York City, Ordinary Days tells the story of four people struggling to connect.

It's made up of pieces that, like its characters, reveal themselves to be a part of a much bigger story than we might have first imagined. 

When initially thinking about this project, I focused on how skylines can change and develop without anyone really noticing. And the thought that so much of our lives can be contained within these buildings, yet we don’t know anything about the lives in the buildings next to us. I started looking into ways we could show the stories held within these buildings and how they could all connect.

I wanted to design a set that would build and evolve throughout the play, illustrating the ‘coming together’ of the characters, and ultimately creating a modern tapestry showing an ordinary day.

By deconstructing the typical New York skyline into simple building blocks, we could start the show with these four individuals as solitary ‘towers’, slowly building and coming together to form a singular canvas as we live out their experiences.

Structurally, I also wanted the set to build to an environment for the final scene. In this iconic scene, two of the characters are standing on a roof top, with the other two below them on the sidewalk. For this it was important to show the elevation for real impact. By masking platforms for the actors to stand upon behind the initial ‘towers’, we were able to achieve this and the final complete structure acted as the side of a New York building.

As the scenes played out, the characters would seamlessly bring on and interact with additional cubes. These would make up tables, New York cabs, moving boxes and shop fronts. As stories were told, these cubes would then be added to the canvas.

The minimal styling, from the simple deconstructed set, normal-feel costumes to the white props throughout, really helped to put emphasis on the stories being told and to create a cohesive style to the show.