CMU School of Drama


Thursday, February 19, 2026

Decor and Design Details to Love in Fennell's Wuthering Heights

Film and Furniture: Emerald Fennell’s 2026 adaptation of Wuthering Heights moves decisively away from traditional windswept naturalism and treats design as emotional voltage, using architecture and surface to heighten every feeling.

2 comments:

Jess G said...

Yes, the production was beautiful. Yes, the sets were wonderful, and I guess could be considered a thematically appropriate set of locations. But it makes no sense! The design is so off from the story theyre trying to tell. Why is the wall made of skin? Why are there hands everywhere? The only production design element I thought made sense was the bottle room. I thought that show was BEAUTIFUL. Where Catherine's dad is dead, and the giant, human-sized bottles are piled up surrounding him. I think that the production designer could have done such a beautiful job with this if she had not been given an absolutely insane premise by emerald Fennel. This designer, Suzie Davies, also designed Conclave and Saltburn, and has incredible talent for meeting a theme. I loved the design of Conclave; it really told the story of a falling apart religion quite well. I just could not get behind the Wuthering Heights thing.

Eliana Stevens said...

I recently just watched this movie for the first time, and I had never read the book. And I first want to talk about just the art aesthetic and images that were seen throughout the show. I think that they went very abstract, and every little detail had an intention and a connection to a feeling. Some of my favorite art decisions was when the father was dead and he was quite literally surrounded by towers and towers of beer symbolizing his addiction I thought that was a beautiful art piece and imagery that we see there I also really enjoyed Catherine's death scene when she dies and she has leeches all over her body and they are going up the wall In which the wall is created to look like her skin so I thought that imagery was really beautiful In an abstract way. I also thought that the blood coming from her was moving in a way that it felt like the whole room was filling with her blood, and the room being her skin said so much more.