Danielle Croom

is an interdisciplinary creative working in theater, architecture, music, poetry, film, photography, and visual arts

Scenic Design

Architecture

Writings

  • An image of the Jinyun Quarry (DNA Design and Architecture)

    (Dis)Comfort Architecture: An Anthology

    Fall 2024

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  • Image of the Yates Gallery at Chicago Cultural Center, text reads: you are looking at unceded land

    Building Future Ruins

    Fall 2024

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  • A Vote for Dionysus in '68 Leads to Bart Simpson in 2069: Design Studies for Applied Environmental Scenography

    Spring 2025 Honors Thesis

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About

Danielle never learned how to pick one passion. From a young age she showed proclivities towards music, theater, and architecture. Growing up in Seattle, WA provided opportunities to explore highly influential architectural works, walk the same paths as famous musicians, and fostered a deep reverence for nature.

After moving sight unseen to Minneapolis for college, and later studying abroad in Copenhagen, Danielle developed a love for travel and new experiences, and a resiliency to fear and awkwardness.

Now, Danielle is an alumnus of the University of Minnesota with a Bachelor of Design in Architecture, a Theater Arts Technology and Design minor, and summa cum laude Latin Honors. She works in the University’s scene shop as a staff carpenter, helping to build sets for productions at both UMN and Penumbra Theater. Her most recent project was her honors thesis, which focused on Environmental scenic design, and culminated in co-directing and designing a production of Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play.

Whenever Danielle is not in the studio, rehearsal, or the scene shop, she can be seen performing on the long form improv team Friends From College, writing songs and poetry, playing pickleball, speed puzzling, and going down research rabbit holes.

Get in Touch!

Danielle with Boy (1992) by Charles Ray, Art Institute of Chicago