Program Overview

The course is taught by design practitioners and researchers, and enriched by national and international visiting tutors from a range of creative industries in an expanded mode of design. You will explore the role of graphic design as a tool through which to critically investigate current issues and contemporary visual culture, society, politics, identity, information, education, and technology. Your position as a designer will also be explored through design practice and theory.

You will develop your practice with specialist support through adaptable ‘Platform' groups such as Socially-Engaged Design, Visual Identity and Branding, Language and Publishing, and Interactive Design. These groups provide a lens through which to respond to briefs in each module, and develop your own research methods and practice through an Expanded Research Project.

You will be taught by a team of experienced design practitioners, educators, and published researchers. You will visit professional design studios and hear from inter
ational guest speakers from industry, work on live projects, on competitions, and participate in workshops.

Underpinned by critical thinking we work across design fields such as; speculative design, information design, social justice, sustainable design and branding, visual identity, design pedagogy, interactive design, film, photography, typography, exhibition design, user experience, (digital and print) editorial design. With an emphasis on process you will be encouraged to innovate, invent and inspire change in an expanded future-facing approach to the discipline.

We employ developmental models such as the Double Diamond (Design Council, UK, 2006) to help structure a holistic development of your research methods from initial observations and analysis, through seminars and reviews, and experimentation with media, to audience engagement. In this context, research is not only a working process it can also be considered an outcome in its own right. In a studio-based community of practice you will work collaboratively in teams and individually, with local communities, third sector groups and other disciplines to discover new methods and meaning through design. Theory and practice are integrated in a critical examination of the media, methods, concepts, histories and future technologies of design.