The global environmental crisis brings with it an opportunity to rethink current practices in both commercial and cultural sectors. In the Performing Arts, design practices currently have little regard for their environmental impact, and are largely unsustainable. The industry requires a creative and comprehensive exploration of sustainable strategies, to determine how design practices can be updated to comply with environmental considerations, and to enable the industry to take a central role in environmental advocacy and education. This paper will provide an overview of the current status of ecological design in the Performing Arts. It will review some of the barriers associated with the implementation of sustainable design strategies, and suggest how designers and organisations in the Performing Arts might move forward on the agenda.