Why study with us?
- International links and overseas teaching, with workshops taking place in Milan, Istanbul and Beijing in recent years
- Featured university in the book Masterclass: Interior Design, a guide to the world's leading graduate schools
- Dual emphasis on creative and critical enquiry in the broad context of the visual and performing arts, design and the humanities
- Interdisciplinary workshops that encourage you to think across a range of design fields including architecture, urban design, fashion and textiles
- A creative, technical and theoretical approach that helps you to become a professional leader in the field of interior design.
A selection of work by Interior Design MA students for their Design Museum project
Course structure
During semester 1, the projects set for the Preliminary Design module provide an opportunity for students returning to education to take stock of their position, evaluate their strengths and weaknesses, and identify ambitions for future study. Lecture courses in Technology and Material Practices, Critical Readings and Research Methods run in parallel.
In semester 2, you consolidate and extend the priorities, ideas and strategies established in the preliminary design. Lecture series in Technology and Critical Readings continue. A proposal for the final research project is developed and submitted, which then takes up the whole of semester 3.
Students develop new skills while extending existing design practices to precisely articulate spatial design proposals.
We offer at least one study trip each year. It might be related to the design studio or a trip that offers you direct exposure to and experience of some of the most contemporary spatial design projects in Britain and mainland Europe.
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.
Syllabus
Our starting point is to acknowledge the complexities and paradoxes inherent in orthodox architectural documentation in order to unearth the dubious simplifications and missed opportunities that result from the tendency to privilege the visual at the expense of our other senses.
In anticipation of 'the creative user', all our proposals originate from a close focus on the existing condition, paying particular attention to local takeovers, autonomous occupations and the blurring of boundaries of ownership and programme. In considering issues of technology, we are concerned as much with intuition, desire and chance as with precedent, economy and established practice.
Core modules
Preliminary Design
During semester 1, the projects set for the Preliminary Design module provide an opportunity for students returning to education to take stock of their position, evaluate their strengths and weaknesses, and identify ambitions for future study. Lecture courses in technology and the chosen optional module run in parallel.
Main Design Project
By semester 2, work undertaken for the Main Design module consolidates and extends the priorities, ideas and strategies established in Preliminary Design (talks and tutorials on Technology and Material Practices continue to run parallel with the studio project).
Research Practices
Throughout this module, you develop your research skills to construct research questions, hypotheses and methodologies, which you will adapt to issues of personal interest. You also develop and submit a research project proposal.
Situate
This module will introduce established and emerging principles, theories, and thematics in design. The module will help you situate yourself, your interests and practices within contemporary design discourses and global contexts and help identify and nurture personal motivations within your area of specialisation.
Themes covered may include sustainability, powers and politics, equalities, systemic complexity, and creating change through design.
Masterwork
The Masterwork is the culmination of the course and may be undertaken through creative design practice supported by critical text or as a text-based thesis. The development of the Masterwork proposal is supported by research-based seminars and regular seminar presentations with supervisory input from your course tutors.
Options*
Choose one from:
- Independent Project (Architectural and Urban Design)
- Design 1: Urban Strategies
- Planning Theory
- Policy and Implementation in Town Planning
- Sustainable Urbanism in Coastal Communities
- Technology and Material Practices
- Sustainable Design Future(s)
*Option modules are indicative and may change, depending on timetabling and staff availability.