Skip to Main Content

Production & Design

A curated guide for Performing Arts Production & Design resources at Pace Libraries

Subject-Specific Resources

Need to find a book on a particular subject? 

Materials in the Pace Library are organized by subject. Browsing the shelves in-person or online can help you discover new work, materials, inspiration, and connections. Listed below is a list of call number ranges and dedicated subject headings for properties, scenery, lighting, and related topics. Be sure to search for subject headings in the online search feature using quotations marks!

  • NA+: Architecture
  • ND2885 +: Scene painting
  • PN2091 .E4: Electric devices > stage lighting
  • PN2091 .S8: Stage settings > scenery
  • PN2085 - PN2901: The stage and accessories

Scene painting

Set designers

Stage lighting

Stage lighting designers

Stage machinery

Stage management

Stage props

Theater--History

Theater--Production and direction 

Theater--reviews

Theaters--Electronic sound control

Theaters--Lighting

Theaters--Sound effects

Theaters--Stage-setting and scenery 

Looking for professional or trade publications in your discipline? 

Here is a list of publications, magazines, and trades dedicated to the professional and educational worlds of professional theatre technicians and designers. 

Looking for subject-related websites?

This is a list of useful websites related to the study, practice, and professional experiences of practitioners in the field of theatre production & design. 

  • Theatrecrafts.com: dedicated to technical theatre topics such as shows, venues, glossaries, archives, and other helpful information.
  • Production Designer's Collective: dedicated to mutual support through sharing knowledge, encouragement and experience. The Collective enables its members to exchange professional experiences, give and receive advice, discuss current issues in the field and construct a community of like-minded visual creators. 

Looking for primary sources online or in the NYC area?

Provided below is a list of in-person and digital archives featuring various archival collections of theatre productions, designs, lighting plots, and ephemera. 

  • New York Public Library Digital Collections: Digitized images, mostly in the public domain; from books, magazines, newspapers, original photographs, prints and postcards. Years covered: Most before 1923.
  • Billy Rose Theatre Divison, The New York Public Library for Performing Arts: The Billy Rose Theatre Division of The New York Public Library is one of the largest and most comprehensive archives devoted to the theatrical arts. Encompassing dramatic performance in all its diversity, the division is an indispensable resource for artists, writers, researchers, scholars, students, and the general public.
  • The Primary Stages Off-Broadway Oral History Project: serves to fill a gap in theater scholarship about an innovative period in post-WWII America by establishing a video archive featuring the artists who created Off- and Off-Off-Broadway. In their own words, actors, casting agents, directors, designers, press representatives, producers, playwrights, theater founders, and others share their personal accounts of how Off- and Off-Off-Broadway emerged and flourished. 
  • The Lighting Archive: a collection of actual lighting plots, focus charts, cue sheets and other documents from real shows. Founders and moderators place an emphasis on historical productions and designers who have made important contributions to the field of lighting design.
  • Theatrical Lighting Database: created as a joint project of the New York Public Library and the Lighting Archive.