Susan Benson has designed for the theatre, opera and ballet in Canada, the United States, Australia and Europe. She trained in England receiving an ATD from the West of England College of Art. Before emigrating to Canada she worked for the Royal Shakespeare Company and BBC Television. Since 1966 she has created set and costume designs throughout Canada, the United States, Australia and Europe.

Since 1974 she has designed many productions for the Stratford Festival of Canada, and was Head of Design for Artistic Director John Hirsch. Productions at Stratford include A Midsummer Night’s Dream with Maggie Smith, Cabaret, Guys and Dolls, and Twelfth Night. She has won many awards for her stage designs, including an Academy of Cable Television's ACE Award for The Mikado directed by Brian Macdonald.

For the Canadian Opera Company she has designed Death in Venice, La Forza Del Destino, Madama Butterfly and The Golden Ass.  Productions for other companies have included The Ballad of Baby Doe for San Francisco Opera and the New York City Opera, Don Quichotte for New York City Opera, The Gondoliers for the Australian Opera Company, The Magic Flute for Minnesota Opera and the Dallas Opera, and Marriage of Figaro for the Banff Centre.

Ms. Benson has also designed The Taming of the Shrew and Romeo and Juliet for the National Ballet of Canada, The Royal Winnipeg Ballet, and for the National Ballet of Finland. Her designs were used in the National Ballet of China’s production of Romeo and Juliet in 2006.

She has taught at the National Theatre School and University Theatre Departments in Canada and the United States. In 1986 she was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts.  Ms. Benson has received eight Dora Mavor Moore awards, a Jessie and has represented Canada five times at the Prague Quadrenniale.  She was awarded the Banff Centre National Arts Award for her contributions to the Arts in Canada in 2000, and in 2001 she received the Canadian Institute of Theatre Technology Professional Achievement Award.

An exhibition ‘Lives Lived’ of her pencil portraits and paintings were shown at Gallery Stratford in March 2006. Her portrait of Eric Donkin is in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery.