Experience Design BDes (Hons)

Experience designers create things that better connect us, attract us, involve us and include us. They make our lives easier, more fun and more meaningful, in big and small ways.

This course covers aspects of User Experience (UX) such as:

• user interface (UI) design
• graphic design
• apps

You will move beyond mere usage to understand, perceive, connect, and engage people through your designs. You will extend your creativity beyond the screen to create products, services, spaces, and more.

Experience design is where people, technology and design meet.

You will learn industry-ready skills across all of these areas. You will learn how to use them together professionally to take projects from first idea to beautifully crafted outcome.

In learning about people, you will find that people aren’t just ‘users’. They are the centre of your approach. They will very often act as your collaborators and your creative inspiration. You will learn to really see people and to understand them deeply. This will touch on understanding their culture, identity and how they see the world. With this understanding, you will see where your design ideas could fit into their lives.

You will creatively harness current technologies to design new experiences. You will learn how to work with emerging technologies. This will prevent you from being stuck to any particular platform or medium. You will also learn how to stay flexible and ready to experiment with new opportunities playfully and creatively.

Experience designers can influence what the future looks like. You will explore using AI and other emerging technologies as design tools. You will look at how new technology could impact people and society in positive, negative (and ambiguous) ways in the future.

What the course involves

As a four-year undergraduate degree, the first year involves a general foundation in art and design where you’ll develop your core design skills for visualising your creative ideas and making things tangible.

In year two, you’ll learn fundamental graphic design principles and technology prototyping skills. You will learn this through hands-on practical activity. You will also learn how to design concepts with a variety of open-source programming languages and hardware. This will help you to develop physical interactions through connected objects. You will learn to observe and record people and places with sensitivity. You will use tools to make sense of what is found. You will be able to tell engaging stories and communicate those stories with colleagues, stakeholders and the public.

Experience designers have a role in shaping future technologies. They will meet new technologies throughout their career.

In year three, you will apply a speculative design method. This will allow you to imagine and visualise different technology futures. You will also develop a deeper understanding of the different roles of prototyping. This will be in the context of a digitally enabled experience using technology to connect two or more people.

In year four you will bring together chosen elements that you have learnt throughout your studies. This will take the form of a personal, self-directed honours project. You will produce design outputs that draw upon the knowledge and skills already developed throughout the course. You will take part in our Degree Show exhibition. In this, you will showcase your honours project. This is an opportunity to target your work towards potential employers.

You’ll have the opportunity to draw, design, program, make circuits, 3D print, woodwork, screenprint, throw ceramics, laser cut, cast metals, make films, and prototype apps. We'll help you find your medium and identity as a designer, ready to go out into the world and apply everything you’ve learned