Interior Design BA(Hons)

International requirements and visas

We can help you meet our English language or academic entry requirements.

Visas and immigration advice

Portfolio advice 

Admission to this course includes a review of your portfolio. This helps us to see your potential and understand how you think, create and explore ideas. We want to see your passion and curiosity – not just your finished work.

Creating your portfolio

Find out what to include in your portfolio and how to present it by reading our portfolio requirements.

Sharing your portfolio

Once you have applied and received details on how to activate your University of Brighton username and password, you can log on to Student View and share your portfolio link. Please make sure we can access this link without a password or login.

Support and advice

Take a look at our advice and guidance on creating a portfolio. If you need help, please contact our Admissions Team. We also run regular online portfolio advice sessions where you can get support from our expert team.

Top reasons to choose this course  

• Develop a standout portfolio for careers or further study through studio-based projects and live briefs, designing for real people and places.
• Study in a city known for its creative industries, cultural diversity and sustainable ethos. Brighton’s architecture and imaginative commercial spaces offer you nearby case studies and fieldwork opportunities to connect classroom learning with contemporary practice.
• Learn to use professional software like AutoCAD, Rhino and Cinema 4D, alongside hands-on model-making and 3D printing.
• Portfolio workshops, industry events, links with the British Institute of Interior Design (BIID) and an optional placement year give you work experience and useful contacts to make you career-ready.
• Work in a collaborative learning environment, with architecture and interior architecture students, reflecting how real design teams work and encouraging creative exchange.
• You’ll learn with passionate staff who have industry experience, benefit from guest lecturers, and draw inspiration from our impressive alumni such as Michelle Ogundehin.

Year 1

In your first year you’ll explore a human-centred approach to design through projects ranging from intimate spaces to residential scale, working with real sites, contexts and users.

Modules

• Interior Design 1: Situating the Interior
• Architecture Criticism 1
• Interior Design 2: Inhabiting the Interior
• Technology: Principles

Making sure that what you learn with us is relevant, up to date and what employers are looking for is our priority, so courses are reviewed and enhanced on an ongoing basis. When you have applied to us, you’ll be told about any new developments through Student View.

City of Oasis design by interior designer Austin Man Hon Chan.

Year 2

In your second year you’ll focus on the narrative and commercial aspects of interior design. You’ll work on retail, hospitality, exhibition and workplace design briefs, experimenting with branding, identity and adaptive reuse and learning how to use light, material and form to communicate ideas.

Modules

• Interior Design 3: Narrating the Interior
• Technology: Strategies
• Interior Design 4: Commercialising the Interior
• Architecture Criticism 2

Placement year

A placement year gives you the opportunity to gain professional experience either through external work placements with industry partners or working on live projects.

A year on placement strengthens your portfolio, builds confidence, develops your technical and communication skills and provides valuable industry contacts, giving you a competitive edge in the job market.

Previous design students at Brighton have undertaken placements in a variety of roles across the creative industries. Companies such as Interaction in Bath host student placements, offering insights into commercial interior design and workplace strategy. These experiences often lead to lasting professional relationships and even graduate job offers.

Final year

Your final year includes a major project, where you define your own brief and develop a fully resolved design with technical drawings, models and visualisations. Exhibit your final project at the Summer Show – an exciting opportunity to present your vision to industry professionals and the public.

Modules

• Major Design Project 1: Interior Definition
• Architecture Criticism 3
• Major Design Project 2: Interior Development
• Major Design Project 3: Interior Resolution

Facilities 

Facilities and workshops are supported by full-time specialist technicians and include: 

• dedicated studio spaces reflecting collaborative professional practice environments
• specialist model-making and construction workshops with equipment for fabrication in wood, metal, resins and textiles
• photographic studios and darkroom for processing and developing film and prints
• digital fabrication facilities including laser cutting and 3D printing, rapid prototyping, 5-axis milling and CNC routing
• PC and Mac computer suites with relevant professional standard software for CAD, publishing, image manipulation, gaming and VR support
• in-house large format printing facilities for professional quality portfolios which allow you to explore creative graphic techniques
• surveying and audiovisual equipment used to test, explore and communicate different environments, site information or design narratives.

Check out the 360 videos of our workshops and photography studio.

Meet the team

Summer shows 2024

Course fees

Perkins+Will Thesis Prize for Architecture

The £250 Perkins+Will Thesis Prize for Architecture is open to final-year students of the Interior Architecture BA(Hons) and the Interior Design MA. It rewards work that exhibits strong design principles and that shows concern for sustainability, social responsibility, diversity, wellness and innovation.

Interior Architecture Progression Scholarship

Open to first year Interior Architecture BA students, this scholarship provides one student with a grant of £2,000 per year for three years of study, free gym membership for Sport Brighton and a 1–2 week work placement at Charlotte Tilbury. Find out how to apply.

The course fees shown here are what you will pay if you start your course in the academic year 2026–27 and you are studying full-time. You pay fees in each year of your course. The fees you pay may increase each year.

Regulated fees

Fees for UK students on undergraduate and some postgraduate courses are set by the UK government. These are known as regulated fees. The regulated fee for 2025–2026 is £9,535. The government has announced that regulated tuition fees will increase each year in line with forecast inflation from 2026–27 onwards. (Subject to parliamentary approval)

*The regulated fee for UK full-time students taking this course in the academic year 2026–27 will be published here when it is confirmed by the government.

Student Finance England loans for tuition fees and maintenance will also rise in line with inflation.

If you are studying part-time your fee will usually be calculated based on the number of modules that you take.

Unregulated fees

Course fees for international students taking undergraduate courses and for most postgraduate courses are not regulated by the UK government. Unregulated fees may increase each year by up to 5% or the forecast Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation (whichever is higher).

Find out more

• Fees, bursaries, scholarships and government funding info for UK and international undergraduate students
• Student finance and budgeting while studying
• Read our student contract and tuition fee policy (pdf) for more on University of Brighton tuition fees.
• Brighton Boost – cost of living help for our new undergrad students. Find out about how we can help with your study, accommodation or travel costs and more.

Campus where this course is taught

Accommodation

Local area

Maps

Support and wellbeing

Sport at Brighton