About this Course

This programme provides you with an integrated understanding and specialist perspective on the application of culture, context and professional practice in the fashion industry.

Through this dynamic programme, you will benefit from project and studio based work integrating design practice, technology and theory. You will develop, implement and realise creative concepts and marketable products.

Levels and modules are designed thematically to focus on the learning outcomes against the school’s guidelines.

We aim to produce graduates who are imaginative, innovative, versatile and competitive. This aim is achieved by:

• Producing graduates who have acquired theoretical and practical knowledge and skills required by the fashion industry;
  
• Developing graduates with critical and analytical problem solving skills and general transferable skills (interpersonal skills, teamwork, etc.);
  
• Preparing students for a broad range of related employment opportunities.
  

Programme Curriculum

Year 1

Design Process: Concept, Form and Image

During this module you will gain an understanding of the design process, including research methods, exploration of design development, pattern cutting techniques, and toile and garment manufacturing procedures. A series of technical workshops will lead you through the stages of garment construction and sewing techniques and Computer Aided Design (CAD) sessions will help you develop how you communicate your ideas. You will also have the opportunity to work on external projects and to develop your skills through fundraising, financing and staging your own catwalk shows.

Design Culture and Context 1

This module will encourage you to test your research, presentation and written skills, and to be socially and culturally aware when considering your own environment and design decisions. You will be introduced to the power of images, objects and materials in visual and material culture, and see how these are central to the way fashion designers represent, making meaning and communicate.

Year 2

Design Context: Commerce, Technology And Innovation

This module will advance your design practice and help you to develop a greater understanding of the industry through different commercial contexts. There is a focus on professional practice through live industry briefs, global competitions, team working activities, business practices and specialist design, pattern cutting and manufacture skills. In the first half of the module you will negotiate a design brief in collaboration with industry, as part of a team to produce a menswear collection to answer a live industry set brief.

In the second half of the module you will complete an negotiated individual project to help prepare you for your final year. You will also have the chance to opt for electives, investigating other areas of the industry entrepreneurship, ethical fashion, journalism and visual merchandising.

Design, Culture and Context 2

In the first half of the year you will focus on how the commercial contact affects design culture. You’ll consider the role played by design in the creation of desire in a trend-driven consumer culture, in an era of mass production and consumption, and the need of responsibility and sustainability to make design a force for positive change. In the second half of the year you’ll focus on creating a negotiated, individual brief in preparation for your final-year project.

Final Year

Negotiated Fashion Design Portfolio And Research Projects

This year-long module is split into two strands, a fashion design project and a research project. For the fashion design project you will produce an extensive body of 2D and 3D work, with sustained investigation into toiling, fabrication, print, garment construction, CAD and design responsibility. You will have the opportunity to take part in industry-led projects and competitions.

Entry Requirements

Applicants must be of age 17 and above, and meet at least one of the following requirements:

2 GCE 'A' Levels credits or equivalent;

    OR

Relevant Diploma in Fashion Design and Marketing;

    OR

Other relevant diplomas from recognised polytechnics or other Private Education Institutions (PEIs);

    OR

Other qualification from professional institutes may be considered on a case by case basis;

A developed and comprehensive creative portfolio.*

* For Bachelor of Arts (Hons) Fashion Design only

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