How She Makes It

In case you ever wondered “what does it take to work professionally in props?”

Some days, it requires complex artistry—everything from woodworking to welding to painting to upholstery to electronics.

And some days, it’s about picking beans out of canned soup 😁

“From the Witches Notebook”, a new collection of pen/watercolor doodles 🌿🍄🦎

Another project that hasn’t made it to social media yet—this costume for Erica Gillespie (performer and choreographer) in her dance showcase titled “Sub(Em)merge”. This project was co-designed by myself and Vincent Chao and created with the help of the UC Berkeley costume department.

We really wanted to capture the feeling of water rippling across skin, and I think this costume does that. Halfway through the dance, she removed the blue wrap to reveal the 50s-bathing-suit inspired costume as the dancer emerges from the feeling of drowning. This was a zero-budget production, so the only materials used were things recycled or left over from other shows, and the design had to adapt to fit those constraints. You can see our initial designs (design presentation drawn by Vincent, other sketches preliminary designs by me) and how much they evolved before getting to the stage!