Christopher Akerlind is a lighting and set designer who has designed over 550 productions at theater, opera and dance companies across the country and around the world. His collaborators have included directors JoAnne Akalaitis, Christopher Alden, Christopher Ashley, Anne Bogart, Mark Brokaw, Chen Shi-Zheng , Martha Clarke, Karin Coonrod, Joe Dowling, Franco Dragone, Robert Falls, Frank Galati, Colin Graham, Michael Greif, Doug Hughes, Michael Kahn, Neil LaBute, Mark Lamos, Craig Lucas, Lynne Meadow, Jonathan Moscone, Lisa Peterson, Chas Rader-Schieber , Lloyd Richards, James Robinson, David Schweizer, Bartlett Sher, Janos Szasz, John Turturro, Stephen Wadsworth, Mark Wing-Davey, Robert Woodruff, Francesca Zambello and designers Loy Arcenes, Christopher Barreca, John Lee Beatty, Gabriel Berry, Robert Brill, John Conklin, Marina Draghici, Jane Greenwood, Riccardo Hernandez, Susan Hilferty, Robert Israel, Ming Cho Lee, Santo Loquasto, Allen Moyer, Scott Pask, Neil Patel, James Schuette, Douglas Stein, Michael Yeargan and Catherine Zuber.

His extensive credits in opera include productions at the Boston Lyric, Dallas, Glimmerglass, Hamburg, Houston, Metropolitan, Minnesota, New York City, Nissei, San Francisco, Santa Fe, and Seattle Operas and over 40 productions for Opera Theater of Saint Louis where he was Resident Lighting Designer for twelve years.

Recent work includes the Broadway productions of 110 in the Shade, Talk Radio, Well, Awake and Sing, Rabbit Hole, The Tale of the Allergist's Wife and The Light in the Piazza (Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle Awards), Rinde Eckert's Orpheus X at the Edinburgh Festival, the world premiere of Phillip Glass' Appomatox for San Francisco Opera, Anne Bogart's productions of Score, Room and A Midsummer Night's Dream, Robert Woodruff's productions of Oedipus, Olly's Prison and Brittanicus, Martha Clarke's productions of Belle Epoch, Kaos and her revival of The Garden of Earthly Delights, Cymbeline at the Royal Shakespeare Company, and a site-specific outdoor production of The Mystery Plays in Orvieto, Italy.

He is the recipient of an Obie Award for Sustained Excellence in Lighting Design, the Michael Merritt Award for Design and Collaboration, and numerous nominations for the Bay Area Critics, Drama Desk, Hewes, Joseph Jefferson, Kevin Kline, Lucile Lortel, NAACP, Outer Critics Circle and Tony Awards.

In 1996, along with set and costume designer Anita Stewart, he was appointed co-Artistic Director of Portland Stage Company in the state of Maine, a post he held for three years. A graduate of Boston University and the Yale School of Drama he was Head of Lighting Design and Director of the Design & Production Programs at the CALARTS School of Theater and has guest taught at New York University, the University of Connecticut, the Broadway Lighting Master Classes and at his graduate alma mater.