Design (Placement Year)

BA Design is for creative thinkers who want more than a traditional design course – it’s for people who want to challenge the present and design better futures. You’ll explore big questions about society, business, technology and the planet, tackling real-world problems and deciding on which design approaches work best rather than being limited to one type of design.

Alongside developing core design skills such as in graphics and user experience (UX) design, you'll learn how to question current ways of doing things, imagine alternatives, and propose new ways of living and interacting. You’ll learn how to design for sustainable futures, work with real clients and lead creative projects.

Taught by experts from ImaginationLancaster, our internationally recognised design-led research lab, you'll graduate with a bold portfolio, creative confidence, and skills that employers are seeking. You will be ready to begin your career in a range of settings such as in design agencies and design consultancies, tech companies, healthcare, public services and beyond.

Why Lancaster?

• Develop a future-focused, adaptable, and agile skill set that enables you to use design to address complex challenges

• Become a socially and environmentally responsible designer

• Learn from expert designer researchers and practitioners who push the boundaries of design

• Gain valuable industry experience through working on live briefs and with real-world clients

Visualise. Experiment. Create.

At Lancaster, you will work on projects that help you put this view into practice. We nurture creative experimentation, intellectual inquiry, adaptability, critical thinking and ethical awareness as well as emphasising the importance of developing design solutions that are rooted in solid design research. You will learn how to explore and frame problems, generate ideas and translate insights into exciting design outcomes, visualised to industry standards.

Explore what interests you

You will have the opportunity to explore a wide range of relevant topics at Lancaster, including (but not limited to) sustainable futures, healthier lifestyles, cultural innovation, climate action, and the impact of emerging technologies. In your final year, you’ll lead a major project of your own design, exploring your own interests and developing a creative, impactful solution that helps you stand out from the crowd when you graduate. From social innovation to digital futures, previous final-year projects highlight the variety of bold and innovative solutions our students design to address real-world challenges, including:

• Designing to support people with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

• Creating digital and physical tools to enhance children’s language learning

• Developing a ‘wardrobe for life’ to promote sustainability

• Building an interactive device to address loneliness in older adults

• Conceptualising inclusive prison spaces for neurodivergent people

• Reimagining smart home technologies to support positive family communication

Discover your design identity

Throughout your degree, you will be encouraged to explore and develop your own design identity and values. By doing this, you will graduate with a strong sense of where you want to take your design career, and you will develop your portfolio to reflect this.

To support you in planning your future career, we will help you gain professional contacts by inviting design professionals, many of whom are our alumni, to share their experiences of working in the design industry. You will also work on live briefs as well as with real clients, giving you valuable experience you can take forward into your career. In your final year, our Design Consultancy module enables you to work with a real client.

Your Placement Year

Sometimes known as a year in industry, your placement year will take place between your second and final year of study and this will extend your degree to four years.