Patrick Robertson and Rosemary Vercoe

Born to an Anglo-Irish father, Robertson was a night-time navigator during the Second World War and went on to study architecture at Cambridge, where his involvement with student theatrical productions introduced him to theatre design.

In 1950 he moved to Bristol and began working as a scene painter at the Old Vic Theatre, for a while living in the same house as Peter O'Toole. He became resident designer at the Old Vic, developing a signature style of sparse, economic sets which allowed key details to stand out. Some notable productions from this period include Much Ado About Nothing (1954) and The Crucible (1954). During this period the British designer Rosemary Vercoe was also working at the Old Vic as a scenery and costume designer. They eventually married after the breakdown of Robertson's first marriage.

Rosemary Vercoe worked as a theatre designer, predominantly working in costume design. Prior to her time in Bristol she had worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company in the late 1940s as costume designer for productions such as The Taming of the Shrew and as a some-time performer.

The couple moved to Nottingham, where they both started working at the Playhouse Theatre. Here they were first introduced to Jonathan Miller, beginning a series of collaborations which would run to over 20 productions, including King Lear (1969), Danton's Death (1971), The School for Scandal (1972), The Cunning Little Vixen (1975) and The Turn of the Screw (1979).

Robertson and Vercoe relocated to London with their family and worked together on such productions as A Streetcar Named Desire, The Doctor's Dilemma and The Three Sisters .

Perhaps their best known collaboration was for the English National Opera's landmark 1982 production of Verdi's Rigoletto, taking inspiration from 1950s Italian-American mafia, New York tenements and Art Deco. The production has been revived a dozen times.

Robertson died in 2009.