The course promotes individualised, experiential, active and enquiry-based learning offering student choice in curriculum and approaches to study. Independent and critical thinking is encouraged so that students understand the opportunity to identify and redefine problems, offering creative and original design that meets the needs of current and future society. The course specifically asks students to avoid established, conventional ‘business-as-usual’ responses to design challenges, instead encouraging them to become the highly skilled and well-informed change makers needed by society.

Each year of study comprises of four year-long 30-credit modules in the areas of course specific skills, design development and realisation, professional practice, cultural and contextual studies. The curriculum focuses on project work, both individually and in creative teams, reflecting industry practice. The projects are rich and varied, developing essential skills such as editorial design, branding, 3D design, digital design, motion graphics, super graphics, multi-disciplinary and experiential design. Fundamentals such as research strategies, conceptual thinking and market analysis are taught alongside practical studio and workshop skills such as digital design, principles of typography, screen printing, letterpress and photography. Students are encouraged to explore these beyond standard applications and to expand their use, crossing disciplines and combining digital and analogue processes to generate innovative outcomes.

Graduates of the course will be able to interrogate, analyse, reflect upon the world around them and thereby find problems worth solving through engaging visual communication and innovative graphic design solutions. They will be independent critical thinkers and confident, explorative makers in both digital and analogue practice. They will be ethically aware, socially responsible and actively help to work towards a sustainable future. Graduates will be conceptually able, technically proficient and versatile, individual designers. They will be effective communicators aware of the professional requirements of their discipline.