City Design MA

With a global urban population of 4 billion and 28 megacities, urban life is experiencing momentous change. New social groups are emerging, populations are ageing, family units are extending and dispersing, work is becoming casualised and whole communities have moved online. At the same time, dangerous new social divides are appearing on the periphery of cities, between different cultures, and now also between different generations.

UK/EU:

This programme is ideal for those looking to enhance their expertise, develop creative and design-thinking mindsets or change careers. Current students on this programme include:

• Graduates
• Early-career professionals
• Mid-career professionals
• Advanced career professionals

Live Project-based studio work forms the core of activity for the first three terms of the MA City Design Programme, with complementary technical, historical, theoretical and case study seminars occurring in parallel. Group work is encouraged and considered an important introduction to the inherently collaborative process of city design. In the fourth and final term, students will complete an Independent Research Project as an individual submission, which will offer the opportunity to work on a detailed design proposal or thesis with support and feedback from urban and city design practitioners.

Workshops focus on new spatial epistemologies, especially systems of representation, visualisation and calculation. The History & Theory Studies (HTS) unit examines alternative models for the city throughout history, focusing on the way social and political ambitions have become spatialised.

The Royal College of Art is the world’s leading university of art and design, placing at Number One in the 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 QS World University Rankings.

Wholly postgraduate and specialising in teaching and research, the RCA offers the degrees of MA, MPhil and PhD across the disciplines of applied art, fine art, design, communications and humanities. There are over 1,750 Master’s and doctoral students and more than 1,000 professionals interacting with them - including scholars, art and design practitioners--along with specialists, advisers and distinguished visitors.

The College is rightly proud of its graduates'​ achievements. Alumni from the RCA form part of an international network of creative individuals who have shaped and continue to shape the culture surrounding all of us – from the landscape of our cities to the furniture and appliances in our homes, and from the clothes we wear and the films we watch to the work we experience in galleries and the cars we drive.