Visiting Assistant Professor of Costume Design Margarette Joyner first worked as a Costume Designer at the African Heritage Cultural Arts Center in Miami, FL. where she created and built costumes for their dance and theatre productions. While attending the University of South Alabama she was given the opportunity to work at The Lost Colony, the oldest outdoor theatre in the country, under the direction of Broadway designer William Ivey Long. She started as a stitcher and within three years moved up to Shop Manager. She went on to receive her MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University which afforded her the chance to work at The Santa Fe Opera for several years. Her tenure there allowed her to hone her skills by gleaning knowledge from world renowned designers, Willa Kim and Allen Charles Klein. After graduating she landed a job at Theatre IV in Richmond, VA, where she built costumes for their mainstage shows and designed costumes for many of their children’s productions. Joyner went on to teach theatre at Virginia Union University (HBCU) where she was a department of one. While there she not only taught ninety percent of the classes, she also produced, directed, and costumed shows; restructured the curriculum; was the Academic Advisor; authored a Theatre Student Handbook and an Adjunct Handbook for students and faculty; and served a term as Interim Chair. She has designed costumes for Richmond Shakespeare, Richmond Triangle Players, The Theatre Company at Fort Lee, Firehouse House Theatre Company (where her designs for Fires in the Mirror was awarded Outstanding Costume Design by Richmond Theatre Community Circle), and she remains the resident Costume Designer for Cadence Theatre, where she has created costumes for Heathers, Annie Jr. and the world premier of How to Bruise Gracefully. She designed costumes for their short film series Sitelines and web documentary series Bloodlines.
Ms. Joyner is not only a costume designer, but she is also a playwright, having written and produced such shows as Black Cowboys and Cowgirls, Sweet Chocolate and the Seven Christians, (Nominated Best New Play by the Richmond Theatre Critics Circle), What They Did For Us, and Message From an Ancestor which was accepted into the Reader’s Theatre at the 2022 National Black Theatre Festival. She has directed such shows as, Choir Boy, Looking Over the President’s Shoulder, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf, For Black Boys Who Have Considered Homicide When the Streets Were Too Much, (in rep) Ceremonies in Dark Old Men and From the Mississippi Delta just to name a few. As an actress she was cast in the lead role of plays too numerous to name and gave voice to 18th century enslaved women at the largest living history museum, Colonial Williamsburg. She was the spokesmodel for Glory Foods, which put her picture in Southern Living Magazine and was the only undergraduate student to receive a scholarship to Dad’s Garage in Atlanta, Ga., nominated for her designs of The Reluctant Dragon and placed fourth out of over six hundred contestants at the Kennedy Center’s American College Theatre Festival in the same year. Her rich voice has been sought after in musical theatre, churches, gallery openings and much more. She is a published author of poetry and co-authored a book, When I Kill Him Jesus Can Have Him. Ms. Joyner founded The Heritage Ensemble Theatre Company in Richmond, VA and served as the Executive Director, Director and Costume Designer for 10 years before moving to Charlotte.