Description: This production was performed on our main stage in Ethington Theatre at Grand Canyon University. Our scenic budget for the show was around $6,000. Throughout this process I was so blessed to have an incredible assistant scenic designer, Abbie Roberson, whom I got to teach as we went through the process. She was an incredible help in researching, decision making, building, & painting throughout the experience and also designed the organ pipe entrances. I attended production meetings, conducted research, collaborated with the director and other designers, created a mood board, drew multiple renderings and ground plans, created elevations, managed teams of volunteers helping with the construction, taught volunteers new scenic painting, carpentry, and welding skills, and fell in love with the incredible historical figure of Ada Lovelace-Byron.


Concept: Ada and the Engine is an incredible drama that explores some of the deepest struggles of the human heart and mind. Ada Byron, daughter of Lord Byron, struggles to find her place in the world of the 19th century that does not appreciate her understanding of the connections between mechanics, math, music, and poetry. Michael Kary, the director of the production, articulated, “The poetry and mathematics of Ada and the Engine rest on the razor's edge between the known and the unknown, the mind and the heart, and the possible and the impossible.” As a designer, I was able to empathize with Ada as I have always loved math and theatre; however, they were always presented as such opposites. For two things to share such a fine line, though, they cannot be all that different. Therefore, my concept for my scenic design of Ada and the Engine was to marry the past, present, and future through the beauty of mechanics, math, music, and poetry, ascending to freedom. Because of this, there were two sides to the stage: Ada’s in purple and Babbage’s in green. All the while, however, they were both on a circular gear, which, by definition is unable to have “sides”. Almost all of the set pieces were always on stage during the performance, and new technology, such as projectors, illuminated long known math concepts on large blackboards for which Ada laid much of the groundwork. A colorful array of books poetically lined the shelves of the bookcase, and the musical bird cage surrounding this mechanical and mathematical world further demonstrated how music was a part of everything, and yet Ada’s understanding of this held her captive. She desired to attain the impossible, or in her words, “all of the impossible things.” The unity between math and arts is often viewed as impossible; however, the audience could see its collaborative beauty in this one production. And according to Ada, “The difference between 0 and 1 is the whole world. I find.”

GCU News Article: https://news.gcu.edu/gcu-news/ethingtons-season-opener-computes-with-math-science-romance/

GCU News Article: https://news.gcu.edu/gcu-news/by-kennedy-centers-calculations-gcus-ada-and-the-engine-a-national-winner/