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"Max Dorey’s immersive design... [is]
claustrophobic, disconcerting and often - in Christopher Nairne’s careful lighting design - pitch black."
– Matt Trueman, Whatsonstage
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"Add to this Christopher Nairne’s fantastic lighting, playing with complete darkness, low lighting, and small light sources such as phone screens and candles, Cargo is
a dangerous and dark creation with a stifling aesthetic and atmosphere..."
– James Waygood, Grumpy Gay Critic
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"... each theatrical element [is] rich in calorific value.
The striking lighting design... resembles the tone and angles of a graphic novel..."
– Pauline Flannery, Stage Won
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The Real Ones (Bush Theatre)
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"... Christopher Nairne’s lighting [brings] some real edge to the recurring club scenes, with
beats and strobes that gradually shift from thrilling to threatening."
– Katie Kirkpatrick, Broadway World
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"Christopher Nairne's flickering lighting
enhances the sense of the years slipping past."
– Clive Davis, The Times
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"... the many locations [are] summoned with Christopher Nairne’s
brilliantly busy lighting."
– Tim Bano, Time Out
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting and Pete Malkin’s sound are
original, inventive and atmospheric..."
– Genni Trickett, Last Minute Theatre Tickets
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"For much of the production, Guy Jones’ direction and Cécile Trémolières’ set is unassuming and restrained (the same goes for Christopher Nairne’s intelligent lighting). But every once in a while, all these subtle theatrical flourishes - these small but significant human touches - pull together and create something big...
the lighting begins to play with our senses...
little lights glimmer and dance through the trees."
– Miriam Gillinson, Exeunt
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"[The set] is complemented by Christopher Nairne’s
sympathetic lighting design that bathes the stage in a fading light..."
– Amy Yorston, British Theatre Guide
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"Christopher Nairne’s
hypnotic, paranoid lighting
is particularly stunning."
– Tim Bano, The Stage
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"... most striking is Christopher Nairne’s spectacular lighting...
sharp bursts of colour to show Rach’s anxiety, reality-eliding strobe lights, or rippling swells like delicate sound waves."
– Marianka Swain, The Arts Desk
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"... pencil-thin concentric rhomboids of light... flash and flicker and glow with white and blue and red against the surrounding darkness (design, Christopher Nairne).... From the very first ‘boom’ of deep electronic vibration that beats through our ears, combined with a perfectly synchronised ripple through the ribs of light on the stage,
we are held together by this technological artistry."
– Julian Eaves, British Theatre
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"Neon arches and atmospheric lighting (Christopher Nairne)... add to the overall sense of threat and energy in this
astonishing masterpiece that haunts the mind well after the crashing chords and hallucinatory visions have subsided."
– David Guest, The Reviews Hub
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"Christopher Nairne...
took a near empty space and created extraordinarily evocative atmospheres
with great economy, using pulsing patterns and the glow of neon to whip up affecting moods from tenderness to emotional excess."
– Judging panel, Profile Awards
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"... lighting by Christopher Nairne...
pulsates with hedonistic excess
and then tightens its focus around the couple like a visual embrace."
– Arifa Akbar, The Guardian
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"The lighting design elevates this show, and it is no wonder Nairne’s designs received an Offie nomination last year...
his designs tell the story fluently."
– Amy Rye, Lost in Theatreland
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"... Christopher Nairne’s lighting is
moodily pitch-perfect..."
– Ian Foster, There Ought to be Clowns
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"... richly lit
by Christopher Nairne..."
– Natasha Tripney, The Stage
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"... peppered with blinding and dazzling lighting...
you’ve got a production that can only be described as ‘otherworldly’."
– James Waygood, Grumpy Gay Critic
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Tom Fool (Orange Tree Theatre)
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"Lighting designer Christopher Nairne effectively picks out moments that need attention, occasionally focusing on the depressed inertia of a character
- not easy in so small a space -
before returning to the brightly lit drama of a family in clear view."
– Sara West, Everything Theatre
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting
can hollow out darkness
with an effect that makes everything... garishly relentless..."
– Simon Jenner, FringeReview
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"... warmly illuminated
by Christopher Nairne’s intimate lighting."
– Matt Dicks, The Stage
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Boy Parts (Soho Theatre)
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"The stage is often set only by light, either streaming in from the aperture upstage, or flashing in sporadic motions across the entire theatre.
Nairne plays with the architecture of the stage image, toying with the space’s dimensions as a photographer with their camera – or indeed, a predator with their prey.
At times, the stage fills with amorphous blurs bleeding from Irina’s prostrate body and testing the audience like a rorschach card; at others, the backdrop flushes from white, to pink, to a blazing and ravenous red."
– Ian Kirkland, Theatre Weekly
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"It’s eerie to say the least, thanks to
a feast of stylish visuals..."
– Paul Vale, The Stage
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"The sound (Tom Foskett-Barnes) and lighting (Christopher Nairne) designs are contemporary and raw...
Flickering lights, pulsing beats, prolonged projections of brightly coloured screens
– all of these combine to build audience discomfort..."
– Auriol Reddaway, The Spy in the Stalls
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"Technically flawless..."
– Alun Hood, Whatsonstage
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"Christopher Nairne's lighting design
dances off the rainbow walls..."
– Fiona Scott, Broadway World
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"Lighting designer Christopher Nairne has... harnessed this cavernous space to create an atmosphere which marries beautifully with [Ben] Ellis’ words and [John] Kachoyan’s direction. This is a huge space to light and
with a show that is so epic... it is impressive that Nairne has managed to pull off such intimate moments so successfully."
– Skye Crawford, Fringe Review
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Infamous (Jermyn Street Theatre)
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"Christopher Nairne provides gentle but effective lighting –
the soft but vibrant light of dusk and dawn rendered beautifully."
– Flora Doble, The Spy in the Stalls:
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"The mood shifts like glass caught by changing light
(the clarity and mists of Christopher Nairne’s... lighting are very fine)."
– Susannah Clapp, The Observer
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"The cloister's pillars are clothed in crumpled silver brimming with fairy lights, part of
an ambitious and nimbly effective lighting design by Christopher Nairne
which mixes electric light with candles to play with both the texture and colour of different kinds of light."
– Charlotte Valori, Bachtrack
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting design is
cheerfully reminiscent of a videogame,
especially when paired with Giles Thomas’ electronic sound effects."
– Fergus Morgan, Everything Theatre
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting design
pins Joe like a moth with cold, clinical beams
or bathes him in the golden glow of the past as he takes refuge in memory."
– Sam Marlowe, The Times
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"... Christopher Nairne’s
peerless lighting...
[allows] lightning-fast shifts of mood and location..."
– Ian Foster, The Public Reviews
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"… Christopher Nairne’s evocative lighting gives
fresh intensity to the swiftly changing scenes."
– Jane Martin, Whatsonstage
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"... Christopher Nairne’s
magical lighting projects an ethereal shadowy moon
above illicit assignations."
– Sheila Cornelius, Remote Goat
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"... superb lighting effects and video projection
from Christopher Nairne and Dariusz Dziala..."
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"The production exudes a sepia toned 50s aesthetic,
from the rusted illuminated ‘T’ which greets audiences in the bar, to the warm glow of the string lights which adorn the auditorium,
and dually allude to the makeshift aplomb of Ted culture, as well as the austerity of its post-war roots. A clever detail from lighting designer Christopher Nairne."
– Charlotte O’Growney, Talk Stagey to Me
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting was beautiful and
set the tone perfectly for each scene."
– Charlotte Hurford, The Spy in the Stalls
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Chloe Kenward and Christopher Nairne added great touches to Deen's work with lighting,
subtly gracing characters with their own hints of colour.
– James Willstrop, Whatsonstage
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“... a hangover-hurting sunrise blazes through the kitchen window...”
– Mark Lawson, The Guardian
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Samuel Takes a Break… in Male Dungeon No. 5 After a Long but Generally Successful Day of Tours (The Yard Theatre)
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"Christopher Nairne’s
disorientating, high-impact lighting...
[contributes] effectively to the increasing pivot into Gothicism."
– Gary Naylor, The Arts Desk
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"... the transitions... are total horror:
blasts of pure white light or complete darkness,
and unsettling, distorted sound."
– Tim Bano, Time Out
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"... there’s super work... from Christopher Nairne on lighting,
slowly hemming us into the dungeons
that are still incarcerating Samuel today."
– Tom Wicker, The Stage
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"... a Tron-like cage of fluorescent strips
elegently lit by Christopher Nairne
is simple but striking..."
– Natasha Tripney, Exeunt
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"[Delicate and powerful choreographed routines] inhabit set designer Max Dorey and lighting designer Christopher Nairne’s
lightbulb-strung, bombsite wonderland of a set
to create a slick kind of night-time magic."
– Alice Saville, Exeunt
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Farewell Mister Haffmann (Park Theatre)
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"... vignettes of life spent in hiding or in hope,
the darkening shadows of Christopher Nairne’s lighting
[suggest] a society at large given over to rot and ruin."
– Matt Wolf, London Theatre
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"Rebecca Brower’s set and costume design is stunning...
bathed in the warm evocative lighting
of Christopher Nairne."
– Giada, Beyond the Curtain
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“... sympathetically lit by Christopher Nairne’s
atmospheric lighting design.”
– Paul Vale, The Stage
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“... the lighting and music’s
intimate... dynamic set-up
allows the audience to feel immersed...”
– Elmira Tanatarova, Camden New Journal
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"... beautifully lit by Christopher [Nairne],
who transforms the space from a bleak prison to an English hill to an Iraqi desert."
– Fourth Wall Magazine
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Hold On To Your Butts (Arcola Theatre)
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting design is a particular standout,
snapping and flowing us between locations with real ease,
and creating an atmosphere of horror or laughter in equal measure when needed."
– Taylor Vaughan, Whatsonstage
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"[The set’s] transformation from living room to pub is ingenious, and washed over by
Christopher Nairne’s melancholic lighting..."
– Stewart Pringle, Exeunt
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"... elegantly designed and smartly lit..."
– Matt Trueman, Time Out
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"Christopher Nairne’s accomplished lighting design is a key element in Elks’ atmostpheric, engrossing production,
subtly transforming the squalid studio into a place of magic and memory."
– Alun Hood, Whatsonstage
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting
picks out [Dan Frost’s] features almost sculpturally."
– Tom Wicker, The Stage
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting design of blinding flashes
is perfectly complemented by Simon Slater’s... urgently textured soundscape..."
– Ian Foster, There Ought to be Clowns
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"A beam of light snaps onto an old valve radio...
It is an exquisite transformation."
– The Jewish Chronicle
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"Christopher Nairne’s lighting design deserves a special mention in creating incredibly effective moods throughout and
the evocation of nightmarish Fascist propaganda was chillingly well realised."
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"... Christopher Nairne’s space-savvy lighting raises
a bleak bush sunlight over Max Dorey’s set,
both perfectly formed for the Arcola’s smaller studio."
– Kate Maltby, The Times
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"Christopher Nairne’s
sultry lighting saturates the stage
as saxophones sigh."
– Tom Wicker, Time Out
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