Urban Design
MA or PGDip or PGCert
Key facts
Start dates
September 2023
Location
Course length
Full time: MA: 12 months, PGDip: 8 months, PGCert: 4 months. The full-time route is delivered 2 days per week.
Part time: MA: 24 months, PGDip: 20 months, PGCert: 8 month. The part-time route is delivered 1 day per week.
Department
Accreditation(s)
Accredited by Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) as a Specialist Programme. Full RTPI accreditation is available when combined with the Postgraduate Diploma in Spatial Planning or any RTPI partially accredited UG programme such as: BA Urban Design, Development and Planning, and BSc Property Development and Planning.
Overview
Our Urban Design MA brings together theory and design practice to develop your urban design skills.
Urban Design applies to worldwide locations facing contemporary global issues. It combines the form production processes of place and socio-economic drivers that shape the urban realm. And links theory, practice and the urban experience.
You'll be part of an international cohort of students from planning, architecture, landscape architecture and other backgrounds. You will work in design studios with support from professional practitioners and research tutors.
The urban design skills you develop apply to a spectrum of locations and issues and you will be able to create liveable places for tomorrow. You'll also engage with contemporary and future urban issues such as:
- intensification and population growth
- climate change
- cultural design context
- biodiversity and landscape urbanism
- affordable housing
- urban public realm in the digital age.
On graduating you will be employable in professions in a range of fields related to the growth and liveability of cities.
How to apply
Entry requirements
Specific entry requirements
The course is open to applicants who hold a 2.1 undergraduate honours degree (or international equivalent) in a related design & planning discipline.
We will actively consider applications from candidates with lower degrees or an alternative subject, who can provide a suitable portfolio and/or evidence relevant work experience.
Mid-career professional candidates with practice experience are also encouraged to apply.
Please also see the University's general entry requirements.
English language requirements
If your first language is not English you will require a minimum IELTS score of 6.0 overall with 6.0 in all components.
OR
An equivalent English language qualification acceptable to the University.
Please also see the University's standard English language requirements.
English requirements for visas
If you need a student visa to enter the UK you will need to meet the UK Visas and Immigration minimum language requirements as well as the University's requirements. Find out more about English language requirements.
Pathways courses for international and EU students
We offer a range of courses to help you meet the entry requirements for your postgraduate course and also familiarise you with university life in the UK.
Take a Pre-Master's course to develop your subject knowledge, study skills and academic language level in preparation for your master's course.
If you need to improve your English language, we offer pre-sessional English language courses to help you meet the English language requirements of your chosen master’s course.
Terms and Conditions of Enrolment
When you accept our offer, you agree to the Terms and Conditions of Enrolment. You should therefore read those conditions before accepting the offer.
Application process
We advise applying in advance to secure places, and allow sufficient time for applications to be reviewed.
There is no formal application deadline (recruitment closes when teaching capacity is reached).
Applicants should also factor any time needed to meet offer conditions, arrange accommodation, and obtain a UK Student visa (if applicable).
Tuition fees
Questions about fees?
Contact Student Finance on:
Tuition fees
Fees quoted are for the first year only. If you are studying a course that lasts longer than one year your fees will increase each year.
Note for part time students: The per module fee relates to a twenty credit module. The programme consists of four thirty credit modules so the charge per module will be higher.
Financial support and scholarships
Additional costs
Please be aware that some courses will involve some additional costs that are not covered by your fees. Specific additional costs for this course are detailed below.
Learning and assessment
The course's teaching and learning methods are chosen to help develop the student’s capacities as a reflective practitioner. As a result, they are concerned with both the practice of urban design and the processes of reflection on this. We believe that the practice of urban design is best learned through project work and this forms the central emphasis of our teaching and learning strategy. Through live projects you will study design sites from across the world, meaning you’ll have the opportunity to learn how processes operate in practice across a variety of contexts.
You’ll develop tools for understanding and critique through lectures, seminars and workshops, and through the writing of papers that are designed to develop your ability to construct reasoned and critical arguments about complex urban design topics.
Study modules
The programme consists of 4 x 30 credit modules together with research methods and the dissertation or major project. The modules listed below are for the master's award. For the PGDip and PGCert awards your module choices may be different. Please contact us for more details.
Please note: As our courses are reviewed regularly as part of our quality assurance framework, the modules you can choose from may vary from that shown here. The structure of the course may also mean some modules are not available to you.
Learning and teaching
We use a range of activities to deliver theoretical and practice-based content:
- peer-learning through group work and critical assessment of individual projects
- studio set-up and design based learning to mirror real environments in practice
- merged theory and practice modules which are applied in Design studio projects
- problem based learning to gain in depth understanding of urban issues and proposed solutions
- international projects to expose you to different cultures and urban phenomena
- independent research to develop critical thinking and creative approaches to problem solving; you will focus on a specific area of research interest
- use of multi-media for developing skills for communicating
- field trips and site visits to gain a live-in experience and sense of scale for spatial forms.
For full time students, all teaching takes place on two days. This allows the rest of the week for independent studio project development.
Part time attendance is one day per week.
Field trips
UK field studios
London provides a rich field resource for understanding the sense of scale, new interventions and the live-in quality of the public realm. Field studios become teaching references for the design process as well as a means for testing urban theories.
International field trip
This is organised yearly to expose you to specific urban qualities such as:
- housing and social equity
- regeneration
- creative cities and economic rise
- participation
- planning.
Cities visited have included Amsterdam, Lisbon, Rotterdam.
Assessment
Assessment methods used on this course
Assessment combines group work and individual projects and can include:
- reports
- design posters
- videos
- oral and visual presentations.
You will engage with studio tutors and professional practitioners when delivering your assessed work. This process allows for professional quality output.
Research
Our teaching staff provide support for student research. They are actively involved in the following areas of research:
- Visual texture and visual quality
- Urban morphology for critical analysis and design
- Digital media and the teaching and learning of urban design
- Place-identity
- Urban Disaster Resilience
- Town Centre Management and Regeneration
- Urban intensification in the developing world
- Urban visions and policy mobility in Africa
- Live projects, urban labs and the enhancement of student learning experiences for UD and planning
- Plot-based urbanism and regeneration
- Landscape urbanism, biodiversity and the extinction of experience.
For more information visit Land Design and Development (LDD)
After you graduate
Career prospects
Our graduates have very high success rates in gaining employment and have secured posts in the public sector, private consultancy, the voluntary sector, and research and teaching areas.
Programme Changes:
On rare occasions we may need to make changes to our course programmes after they have been published on the website.For more information, please visit our Changes to programmes page.