NEW YORK.-The Metropolitan Opera will present the handmade, intricately detailed set models for the Met Opera's seven new productions premiering the 2007/08 season in its Opera By Design exhibition running Friday, May 25, 2007, through Labor Day in the Arnold and Marie Schwartz Gallery. Free to the public.

Opera by Design is curated by Dodie Kazanjian, and will include set designs for: Lucia di Lammermoor (Daniel Ostling, set designer; Mara Blumenfeld, costume designer; T.J. Gerckens, lighting designer; Mary Zimmerman, director); Macbeth (Mark Thompson, set designer and costumes; Jean Kalman, lighting designer; Adrian Noble, director); Iphigénie en Tauride (Thomas Lynch, set designs; Martin Pakledinaz, costumes; Neil Peter Jampolis, lighting; Stephen Wadsworth, director); Hansel and Grete (John Macfarlane, set design and costumes; Jennifer Tipton, lighting; Richard Jones, director); Peter Grimes (Scott Pask, set design; Ann Hould-Ward, costumes; Peter Mumford, lighting, John Doyle, director); Satyagraha (Julian Crouch, associate director and designer; Phelim McDermott, director; Paule Constable, lighting); and La Fille du Régiment (Chantal Thomas, set design; Joël Adam, lighting designer; Laurent Pelly, director and costume design).

The models are working pieces of art that serve as blueprints from which the Met Opera's army of carpenters, painters, costumers, stagehands, and craftspeople build the set. The exhibition provides a glimpse at how theatrical sensibilities guide the design and direction of operas and how the collaborative vision of designer and director takes shape. Costume sketches and other production materials will also be on display.