Susan Hilferty

Susan Hilferty is an American costume designer and scenic designer for theatre, opera, and dance. She has 27 Broadway credits, and has received six Tony Award nominations for costume design, winning in 2004 for Wicked.

Biography

Early life and education Hilferty grew up in a big family in Arlington, Massachusetts, where her greatest source of joy was the library. "We didn’t have a television," she says. "Reading was my entertainment." says Hilferty, whose interest in art and designing clothing led to her making all of her own clothes by the age of 12.

As an undergraduate at Syracuse University, Hilferty majored in painting with a minor in fashion design. She is perhaps best known for her work on the musical Wicked, currently represented on Broadway and in cities across the globe. For her work on Wicked, Hilferty was awarded the 2004 Tony Award for Best Costume Design, Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Costume Design and Outer Critics Circle Award. Other Broadway credits include Spring Awakening, Into the Woods (2002 Revival), Lestat, Present Laughter (2017 Revival), Parade (2023 Revival), Assassins, Funny Girl (2022 Revival) and Swept Away.

Her work in regional theatre in the United States includes productions with A.C.T San Francisco, ACT Seattle, The Acting Company, Alley Theatre, Alliance Theatre, Baltimore Center Stage, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Berkshire Theatre Festival, Mark Taper Forum, Court Theatre (Chicago), Geffen Playhouse, Goodman Theatre, Guthrie Theater, Hartford Stage, Huntington Theatre Company, Kennedy Center, La Jolla Playhouse, Long Wharf Theatre, McCarter Theatre, New York Stage and Film, Old Globe Theatre, Pasadena Playhouse, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Signature Theatre (Arlington, Virginia), Trinity Rep, Williamstown Theatre Festival, and the Yale Repertory Theatre.

As set designer, Hilferty's work has been seen all over the world. In addition to her collaborations with Fugard, she has frequently designed sets and costumes for director and playwright Richard Nelson including premiere productions of his The Apple Family Plays: Scenes From an American Life, The Gabriels: Election Year in the Life of one Family, and Illyria, all at The Public Theater. Her work with writer and director Yaël Farber includes Hamlet at the Gate Theatre in Dublin and St. Ann's Warehouse in Brooklyn, Salomé at the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington, D.C. and Royal National Theatre in London and Blood Wedding at the Young Vic in London.

Her costume design for opera include productions of Rigoletto, La Traviata, and Aida all directed by Michael Mayer for the Metropolitan Opera.

Hilferty teaches design at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts in New York City where she served as chair for 25 years. When asked what qualities she considers important in potential students, Hilferty replied, "I look for curiosity. I find that unless someone is ready, willing, and able to open themselves up to any number of cultures and stories, they can’t be a designer. Our role as designers is to create a culture. In any given year, I could be working on a play set in South Africa in the 1970s, a musical based on a very small specific Texas town, and a Musical based on a Hans Christian Andersen fairytale. The list goes on, and as designers, we have to constantly be thrilled to ask, ‘What was it like in New York City in 1974? What was it like in India in 1642? What will it be like on the Earth in 2050?’"

She currently lives in New York City.

Awards and nominations