Suzie Lavelle BSC ISC grew up in Ireland and developed an interest in photography while travelling in Australia and Europe. She subsequently studied photography at Stevenson College in Edinburgh before attending art school in Farnham, where she specialised in film and camera department work. She later studied cinematography at the National Film and Television School (NFTS), graduating in 2006.
Following her studies, Lavelle worked as a camera trainee, film loader and camera operator while shooting short films and collaborating with visual artists. Her early work included filming projects for artists Rosalind Nashashibi, Charlotte Prodger and Zineb Sedira, often using 16mm film for gallery installations.
In 2009, Lavelle photographed her first feature film, One Hundred Mornings, directed by Conor Horgan. The film won the Irish Film and Television Award for Best Cinematography in 2010. Her next feature, The Other Side of Sleep (2011), directed by Rebecca Daly, premiered at the Cannes Film Festival’s Directors’ Fortnight.
Lavelle moved into television drama in 2012, photographing an episode of Doctor Who. She subsequently worked on several further episodes of the series and collaborated with director Douglas Mackinnon on Sherlock: The Abominable Bride (2016). Her cinematography on the special earned her a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Cinematography for a Limited Series or Movie.
Her television credits include Vikings (2017–2019), A Discovery of Witches (2018), His Dark Materials (2019), World on Fire (2019) and Normal People (2020). For her work on His Dark Materials, she received nominations for both a BAFTA Television Craft Award and a British Society of Cinematographers Award. In 2020, she won the BSC Award for Best Cinematography in a Television Drama for Normal People, on which she worked with director Lenny Abrahamson.
Lavelle continued her collaboration with Abrahamson on Conversations with Friends (2022), the television adaptation of Sally Rooney’s novel. Her feature film credits include The End We Start From (2023), directed by Mahalia Belo, and Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy (2025), directed by Michael Morris.