IT WAS during a spell performing plays for free in and around London that theatre-lover Lizzie Powell had a bright idea.

“My friends and I had set up this theatre company to build up experience, and I always preferred being backstage,” she explains.

“I’d begun to understand how important lighting is to how the audience feel about what they are seeing – and I thought, I could have a career in this…”

Fast forward 20 years and Lizzie is at the top of her game, an established and respected lighting designer sought by leading directors across the UK.

She is currently working with the National Theatre of Scotland on its production of Edwin Morgan’s Glaswegian-Scots version of Cyrano de Bergerac at Tramway this month, while simultaneously preparing for the transfer of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s acclaimed contemporary production of Macbeth from Stratford-upon-Avon to London.

“Once opening night comes along, usually we make any final changes that day and lock in the show – and then I move on to the next rehearsal room,” she says.

“With Macbeth ending its run in Stratford and moving to the Barbican, I get the chance to go back to it, which is lovely.

“The essence of it will stay the same, but we will spend about 10 days re-teching. The main space at Stratford is very different from the Barbican, so we will be able to do things a little differently in London.”

Lizzie grew up in Herefordshire, right on the border between England and Wales, the daughter of a family planning clinic clerk and a washing machine engineer.

“No theatre in my background at all,” she laughs. “I left school and studied drama and philosophy at Winchester University. I was always interested in theatre, but it was years and years later before I made it my career.

“After my degree I did all sorts of jobs - worked in a deli, in a beach shop in Brighton – while at the same time, a group of us started doing our own bits of theatre work and I applied to LAMDA (London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art) to be a technician.”

During her two-year course Lizzie was given the opportunity to be mentored by awardwinning lighting designer Rick Fisher.

“I was very lucky – in the right place at the right time,” she says. “I was very enthusiastic, I always got very excited about what I was doing, and I think people liked that positive attitude.

“He is an amazing lighting designer, and at the time he was working on the stage show Billy Elliot. He also took me to Venice to work on the Benjamin Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

Lizzie adds: “Suddenly I went from small productions to massive shows, and saw a different side to the job.”

Macbeth, starring Christopher Eccleston and Niamh Cusack and directed by Polly Findlay, is Lizzie’s first RSC production.

“Polly had seen photos of my work and thought it would chime with her ideas of where she would like to take Macbeth,” explains Lizzie.

“It’s a very visual, challenging version, with hints of horror stories like The Shining – Polly wanted the audience to be thoroughly unnerved but not quite understand why they felt so scared.”

The idea of doing something unusual and bold with Shakespeare’s dark psychological thriller appealed to Lizzie, who says she approaches every production differently.

“I like expressive stories, my heart leans towards the experimental,” she says. “I’ve always wanted to light dance, especially, but I haven’t got around to that yet.

“I do a lot of new writing, and I was well up for doing a different kind of Macbeth.”

Lizzie says the craft of the lighting designer has changed considerably over the years.

“The equipment has progressed massively – LED lights are much better now, for example,” she explains.

“Companies are increasingly keen to try something different, which makes it interesting.

“I once lit a whole show at the Traverse with two fluorescent tubes – the kind of thing your Nan used to have in her kitchen.”

She laughs: “It was probably quite brave of the director, to trust me just to turn the lights on and go, but it really suited the piece, which was very stark.”

Lizzie and her partner Niall Black, Technical Director at NTS, live in the west end of the city with their seven-year-old daughter Olwyn.

“When both of you work in theatre, you have this crazy lifestyle where one of you is always off doing something, but Glasgow is our base,” explains Lizzie.

“We are incredibly lucky in this city to have so many practitioners at the top of their game working here. It’s always the case, when I bring someone up from London to work with me in Glasgow or to show them a production, that they are blown away by the quality of the work.”

Lizzie is a big fan of the Citizens Theatre, for whom she has worked on many productions including the most recent Christmas shows.

She will be back at the venue, in its temporary home at Tramway, for this year’s festive production, A Christmas Carol.

“I respect and admire Dominic Hill and it’s great to see the redevelopment of the building taking place,” she says. “I’ve seen the plans, which was exciting. I couldn’t help myself, though - looking at the rehearsal rooms, thinking of lighting rigs…”

Macbeth is at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford until September 18, and at the Barbican in London from October 15 October until January 18.

Cyrano de Bergerac is at Tramway in Glasgow until September 22.