Urbanism and urban design are ambiguous terms that surround and reflect both the physical and mental attributes applied to the built environment combining to form a layered knowledge of the city.
On this course you will examine these two sensibilities working across the disciplines of architecture, art and cultural geography, combining critical debate and creative practice to aid your development as a designer of future urban environments.
The course, based in the School of Architecture and Design, is highly experimental and aims to stretch your imagination and critical ability.
You will produce innovative portfolios and learn about the issues of global urban environments, expanding your knowledge beyond the usual subject boundaries.
Against Brighton’s vibrant, creative and diverse backdrop you will benefit from a supportive studio environment, two field trips and a variety of workshops and seminars, taught by active practitioners in architecture and urban design.
You will engage with research on the analysis of city spaces and lead your own projects, speculating as to how urban environments will evolve and be used in the future
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Design 1: Urban Strategies
This module introduces you to design strategies, methods and issues pertinent to your design studio, helping you to explore the potential of different approaches to design. There is a strong emphasis on the development of conceptual ideas and their correlation with the development of design strategy, helping you to articulate your individual position as a design practitioner.
Design 2
Design 2 aims to consolidate and extend the priorities, ideas and strategies established in Design 1. You will explore architectural and urban ideas in more depth and complexity. The emphasis here is on curiosity and speculation, supporting the development of methods to help with enquiry, reflection and debate.
Independent Project
The independent project runs concurrently and is concerned with your identification of places of ‘conflict’ and negotiations of space. The module encourages experimentation in a specific field of study. Students have developed projects in fields of architectural and artistic practice, creative design, techniques of communication or new technologies.
Critical Readings
The Critical Readings module will develop your skills in critical practice through an analysis of cultural, historical, theoretical and practical issues in architecture. It provides the opportunity to carry out initial investigations into the ideas that will drive your masterwork project.
Research Practices
Research Practices introduces you to the challenges involved in designing, implementing and disseminating a research project. You will develop a written proposal that can inform the development of your masterwork project, encouraging you to consider how your investigations contribute to the academic knowledge in your field.
Masterwork
The masterwork is the final stage of study, requiring you to perform as a self-reflective critical researcher and lay down the foundations for innovation in your future practice. You will develop your project from an agreed research proposal, which may be either a text-based dissertation or a design-led research project with critical reflection. You will be asked to focus the areas of interest that have developed in your previous practice and studies, identify research questions and develop research methods, bringing critical investigation and creative responses together.
The Architectural and Urban Design MA gives you a deep understanding of the issues involved in contemporary practice. As you evolve your own specialist work, you will discover ways to reimagine and reshape the contemporary urban environment.
Our graduates have gone on to be professional architects, academics and urban designers in the UK, Vietnam, Russia, Palestine, Japan, Taiwan, Kenya, Turkey, Lithuania and other countries. Among our alumni are award-winning architects Wei Jiang and Quang Nguyen, who are based in Shanghai and London respectively.
Insurance – Single: 300 GBP per year
