Nick Barnes & Finn Caldwell

Nick began making puppets whilst studying drama at Hull University and theatre design at the Slade School of Fine Art and soon after began incorporating puppets into his theatre designs for opera and theatre.

For many years, he was joint artistic director of the puppetry company Blind Summit Theatre, which he co-founded. In 2012 he co-directed the puppetry in Danny Boyle’s spectacular opening ceremony for the London Olympic Games. As Puppetry Designer for Blind Summit.

Theatre credits include: Madame Butterfly (English National Opera/ Metropolitan Opera); A Dog’s Heart (English National Opera/Dutch National Opera); Shunkin and Master and Margarita (Complicite); El Gato Con Botas (Tectonic Theatre); On Emotion (Soho Theatre); Faeries (Royal Opera House) and His Dark Materials (Birmingham Repertory Theatre/ Leeds Playhouse).

As Nick Barnes Puppets, credits include: Doctor Dolittle (Music & Lyrics Productions); The Lorax (Old Vic Theatre); Ariodante (Festival d’Aix-en-Provence/ Dutch National Opera); Angels wings, Angels in America (National Theatre/Broadway); Running Wild (Associate Designer/Chichester Festival Theatre/Regents Park); David Walliams’ The First Hippo on the Moon (Les Enfants Terribles/UK Tour); Mr Popper’s Penguins (Kenny Wax Ltd/West End/Broadway), The Little Beasts (The Other Palace), The Jungle Book (Royal & Derngate), Beauty and the Beast and The Butterfly Lion (Chichester Festival Theatre), and The Little Prince (Fuel Theatre). He has also designed large scale Firebird and Gnomus puppets for the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall.

You can follow Nicks work at www.nickbarnesdesign.co.uk