Edith Lutyens & Norman Bel Geddes Design Enhancement Fund Overview

Edith Lutyens and Norman Bel Geddes created their namesake foundation to support the design and production costs of New York City-based non-profit theatre companies. The Edith Lutyens and Norman Bel Geddes Design Enhancement Fund provides grants for the artistic needs of a production and allows a designer to more fully realize their artistic vision for a production. 

Design can impact the artists and audiences involved in a production in many ways, from formal and technological innovations to augmenting the audience's experience in the theatre. Applicants may request support for design elements including (but not limited to) sets, lights, sound, costumes, video, puppetry, props, or multimedia design elements.

In essence, we ask you and your design team to dream big and answer the question: "How would your organization spend up to $10,000 on a design element for your production?"

Eligibility

To apply for this grant program, applications must meet the following criteria:

• The applicant must be a company, organization, or artist collective creating, developing, or presenting theatre for at least two years with annual non-capital expenses totaling less than $5,000,000 for its most recently completed fiscal year.

• Individual artists are not eligible. 

• Applicant may be a 501c3, fiscally sponsored, LLC, or unincorporated entity. 

• The applicant must also be an A.R.T./New York Organizational Member in good standing with no outstanding dues, loans, or rent;

• Companies applying for A.R.T./New York membership in order to be eligible for the grant must apply for Organizational membership at least 2 weeks before the grant deadline and should reach out to membership@art-newyork.org explaining their intention to apply, in order to ensure their membership is approved in time;

• Please note FY25 Edith Lutyens and Norman Bel Geddes Design Enhancement Fund recipients must take a gap year and are not eligible to apply again until FY27.

Project Requirements

1. Your grant request should be for the amount necessary to achieve the design element(s) and should not exceed $10,000. 

2. The grant may be used to cover costs directly related to the design including materials, direct labor costs, additional shipping/transportation costs, equipment, etc. 

1. Grant funds may not be used to pay for increased designer fees

3. Applicants may only request funding for one project that occurs in New York City between July 1, 2025 - June 30, 2026. 

1. Touring productions are eligible, provided they have New York City performance dates during the grant period. In cases where a funded project is delayed beyond June 30, 2026 theatres must contact A.R.T./New York to discuss options.

4. Applicants may only request support for ONE design element.

5. The designer should be identified in the application and the designer may be contacted as part of the panel evaluation process.

Timeline

• Application Opens Tuesday, March 25, 2025 at 10am ET.

• Complete the Design Enhancement Fund Application. The deadline to submit your application is Tuesday, April 29th at 5pm ET. 

• No late submissions will be accepted

• The applications will be reviewed and scored by a group of NYC-based designers and theatre-makers. 

• All applicants will be notified about the status of their application by the end of June 2025. 

• Funds will be disbursed in July 2025.

Office Hours

• A.R.T./New York Staff will be offering technical assistance in the form of virtual “Office Hours” with A.R.T./New York staff. All applicants will be able to schedule a 25 minute session, during which we’ll be happy to discuss your responses to questions in the grant application and answer any other questions regarding the grant you may have. Office Hours are open between March 25, 2025 - April 22, 2025.

• Please be sure you have reviewed the grant application, eligibility requirements, and evaluation criteria prior to your meeting. You do not need to have completed responses to the application questionnaire before your meeting, but the more you have prepared the more substantial feedback we’ll be able to provide.

 About the Foundation

The Edith Lutyens and Norman Bel Geddes Design Enhancement Fund was created from the estate of noted designers Edith Lutyens and her husband, Norman Bel Geddes. Edith was one of two girls born in Belgium into an Edwardian era family and it is to her English father that she credits much of her indelible sense of character. Her many accomplishments throughout her life, including representing Belgium in the National Field Hockey team and competing in the 1928 Olympics in fencing, helped to prepare her for a life of challenges and success.

Arriving alone in New York City during the height of the war it was not long before she entered the theater world with her own costume production house and soon was producing for Broadway and Ballet Society; working with such luminaries as George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein; producing the costumes for FireBird with Marc Chagall; Orson Welles on Around the World in 80 Days; South Pacific and so many others. And in 1947 Edith Lutyens produced Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Telephone/The Medium for Broadway. It was during this time that she met and later married Norman Bel Geddes and, in her own words, considered this the happiest time of her life. Together they traveled, collaborated on multiple projects, and remained inseparable until Norman’s death in 1958.

Edith then worked for several years to preserve the Bel Geddes legacy by arranging for all his papers to be archived at The Harry Ransom Center in Austin Texas. This was a major accomplishment and it is to Edith’s credit that Norman’s work is accurately represented today. To further that goal, in 2004 Edith conceived and created the Edith Lutyens & Norman Bel Geddes Foundation with the directive to assist those in the theater world who were most often overlooked; those, like her, who toiled “back of the curtain” as it were; the lighting people, the sound people, the technicians, and of course the costumer. 
A.R.T./New York has been the Foundation's partner in that mission since its inception. The goal of the Foundation is totally consistent with the important work of A.R.T./New York, by supporting design innovation and securing a future for a vital and essential theater in New York City. 

Accessibility

A.R.T./New York is committed to making our grantmaking and funding programs accessible to disabled theatre-makers, artists, and administrators. Our Application Guide and FAQ documents are available in large print. The recorded Information Session has captioning available, and Office Hours Appointments offer automatic captioning through Zoom and Google. Additional accommodations, including ASL interpretation, live captioning, audio description, etc are available upon request. Please submit requests to Adam Mummery and Erica Barnes at grants@art-newyork.org at least 5 business days in advance. 

Header Image: Previous Design Enhancement Fund Grantees. Theatres Represented: Anonymous Ensemble, HERE Arts Center, Houses on the Moon, Immediate Medium, Red Snapper Productions, The Juggernaut Theatre, The Movement Company, The Play Company (PlayCo)