Architecture

Studying Architecture at DMU is about developing the skills and knowledge to have a real impact in our community and the world around us – you will create buildings of the future that offer innovative solutions to the global climate emergency.

Learn about the history of architecture and design, alongside completing technical, practical and professional exercises relating to ethical architecture in the commercial world. Teaching and learning focuses on the design studio, where you will undertake projects in a range of spatial, social and topographical settings, from the smallest of residences and objects through to complex megacities and events. You will work in partnership with students across our built environment courses like you will in professional practice.

Discover how to bring your designs to life by exploring and experimenting with model-making and software. You’ll be taught by both academic researchers and current practitioners so that current industry thinking feeds into your learning.

This course is professionally validated, preparing you for a postgraduate degree in Architecture, which most graduates will progress onto.

Key Features

• Be part of a community that’s working together to change the construction industry from within, so that we can be the changemakers the world needs to address the global climate emergency.

• This course is accredited by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) and the Architects Registration Board (ARB), with students also exempt from RIBA and ARB Part I examinations.

• De Montfort University has a 125-year history of nurturing the next generation of architects with a future-facing curriculum that focuses on the ‘craft of making'.

• Create work with real impact in the community by working on live design projects in the city of Leicester. Past projects have seen students reimagining Leicester Museum and Art Gallery, renovating a derelict site to build an immersive theatre and creating wild pools and saunas on the River Soar.

• Graduates have gone on to work for some of the best architectural practices in the UK and worldwide, including Heatherwick Studio, Make Architects and Shigeru Ban Architects.

• Benefit from the very latest facilities in our award-winning Vijay Patel Building, including dedicated multipurpose studios, CAD labs and workshops offering metal working, woodworking, digital printing, water-jet cutting and prototyping.

First year
Block 1: Studio 1: Exploring Architecture
Block 2: Studio 2: Experiencing Architecture
Block 3: Studio 3: Creating Architecture
Block 4: Studio 4: Writing Architecture

Second year
Blocks 1 and 2: Exploring Ethical and Climate Literacy, Contextualizing Architectural Humanities
Block 3 and 4: Practicing Ethical Design, Applying Climate Literate Design

Third year
Blocks 1 and 2: Design Enquiry and Strategy, Critical and Cultural Thinking
Blocks 3 and 4: Design Proposition and Synthesis, Design Resolution and Professionalism

Overview
The Leicester School of Architecture (LSA) emphasises learning through modelling and making, both manually and digitally, making it an important feature of the course. We encourage and support you to become a productive student by focusing on the design studio as your key learning environment.

In the design studio you will:

• Work and collaborate with peers and tutors in drawing, digital drawing and fabrication, model making, discussion and debate
• Meet regularly with design tutors for small group learning, individual advice and guidance, assessment and feedback
• Engage in instructional/guidance lectures and workshops to develop key manual and digital techniques
• Have design work reviewed by guest architects and critics

A programme of lectures, seminars, tutorials and workshops support your learning in the four key strands of the curriculum:

• Architectural design – project-based learning and assessment
• Architectural communication – project-based learning and assessment around key skill sets including CAD, BIM, digital modelling and fabrication
• Technology and environment – project-based learning and assessment combined with testing your knowledge of key principles
• History and theories of architecture – assessment based on online tests and short written assignments, culminating in a written dissertation, or equivalent, in the final year

In the final year, there is an additional focus on:
• Professional practice and ethics – project-based learning and assessment

Contact hours
You will be taught through a combination of lectures, tutorials, seminars, group work and self-directed study. Assessment is through coursework (presentations, essays and reports) Your precise timetable will depend on the optional modules you choose to take, however, in your first year you will normally attend around 20 hours of timetabled taught sessions (lectures and tutorials) each week, and we expect you to undertake at least 21 further hours of independent study to complete project work and research.