Design

School of Design

A man stands infront of a display of cast masks and teeth.
Waner Zhang, 2025

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Highly accredited
Ranked in the top 50 worldwide, Design at Goldsmiths is both creative and critical.
Gain recognition
Students and graduates gain recognition in national and international competitions, including New Designer of the Year.
Develop critical skills
Our courses combine lectures, workshops, and independent study to develop practical and critical design skills.

Learning

Design is more than a practice, it is a lens for understanding and interacting with the world.

Our courses encourage you to think creatively about what design is and what it could become. You’ll explore how design shapes society, culture, and the environment, learning to approach it as an interconnected system of ideas and actions rather than a set of isolated skills.

Our programmes are shaped by Goldsmiths’ unique intellectual environment, offering an inspiring and dynamic space for design research. Here, you’ll also have the chance to pursue interdisciplinary work that responds to today’s most pressing challenges – whether local, national, or global. 

You'll learn through a mixture of lectures, seminars, tutorials and workshops. You’ll also be expected to undertake a significant amount of independent study. This includes carrying out required and additional reading, preparing topics for discussion, and producing essays or project work.

Read our Design blog. 

At Goldsmiths, you’ll have access to dedicated studio spaces and industry-standard workshops, equipped with the latest tools and technologies.

From laser cutting and 3D modelling to advanced fabrication techniques, our facilities allow you to experiment, prototype, and bring your ideas to life. Whether you’re exploring physical objects, digital designs, or experimental projects, these resources support you in developing your skills.

Students and graduates have achieved recognition in national and international competitions, receiving awards such as the New Designer of the Year, RSA Design Directions, the Design Museum’s ‘Design Mart,’ and NESTA’s Creative Pioneer Programme.

Design graduates pursue careers across a wide range of industries. Recent alumni have worked as creative strategists, set designers, studio managers, product designers, and design educators. They have joined organisations such as Don’t Panic London, Studio Raw, Urban Food Fest, and Peter Millard & Partners, while many others have launched their own agencies, enterprises, and businesses.

Explore more career opportunities on our Design careers page.

At Goldsmiths, you’ll immerse yourself in a subject you love within a welcoming and creative campus community.

Based in South East London, our vibrant setting connects you directly to the capital’s business, technology, and cultural networks. Your learning goes far beyond the classroom through partnerships, guest lectures, and real-world industry experience.

You’ll be supported by inspiring academics, dedicated staff, and fellow students who are passionate about making a difference. And because we’re in London – ranked the world’s number one student city (QS Best Student Cities 2025) – you’ll benefit from our close links with some of the capital’s leading creative and cultural organisations.

Discover the campus for yourself with our Virtual Tour.

Teaching

Design is more than a practice, it is a lens for understanding and interacting with the world.

Our courses encourage you to think creatively about what design is and what it could become. You’ll explore how design shapes society, culture, and the environment, learning to approach it as an interconnected system of ideas and actions rather than a set of isolated skills.

Our programmes are shaped by Goldsmiths’ unique intellectual environment, offering an inspiring and dynamic space for design research. Here, you’ll also have the chance to pursue interdisciplinary work that responds to today’s most pressing challenges – whether local, national, or global. 

You'll learn through a mixture of lectures, seminars, tutorials and workshops. You’ll also be expected to undertake a significant amount of independent study. This includes carrying out required and additional reading, preparing topics for discussion, and producing essays or project work.

Read our Design blog. 

Facilities

At Goldsmiths, you’ll have access to dedicated studio spaces and industry-standard workshops, equipped with the latest tools and technologies.

From laser cutting and 3D modelling to advanced fabrication techniques, our facilities allow you to experiment, prototype, and bring your ideas to life. Whether you’re exploring physical objects, digital designs, or experimental projects, these resources support you in developing your skills.

Awards and competitions

Students and graduates have achieved recognition in national and international competitions, receiving awards such as the New Designer of the Year, RSA Design Directions, the Design Museum’s ‘Design Mart,’ and NESTA’s Creative Pioneer Programme.

Career development

Design graduates pursue careers across a wide range of industries. Recent alumni have worked as creative strategists, set designers, studio managers, product designers, and design educators. They have joined organisations such as Don’t Panic London, Studio Raw, Urban Food Fest, and Peter Millard & Partners, while many others have launched their own agencies, enterprises, and businesses.

Explore more career opportunities on our Design careers page.

Study with us

At Goldsmiths, you’ll immerse yourself in a subject you love within a welcoming and creative campus community.

Based in South East London, our vibrant setting connects you directly to the capital’s business, technology, and cultural networks. Your learning goes far beyond the classroom through partnerships, guest lectures, and real-world industry experience.

You’ll be supported by inspiring academics, dedicated staff, and fellow students who are passionate about making a difference. And because we’re in London – ranked the world’s number one student city (QS Best Student Cities 2025) – you’ll benefit from our close links with some of the capital’s leading creative and cultural organisations.

Discover the campus for yourself with our Virtual Tour.

Research

Our research is known around the world for being inventive, experimental, and deeply connected to social and cultural life. We’ve built a strong tradition of reshaping what design means and exploring how design studies can work hand in hand with creative, practice-led research.

Our staff members have and continue to play foundational and agenda setting roles in the development of design research, defining new fields of design practice and theory, pursuing methodological innovation as well as interdisciplinary engagements across the arts, humanities, sciences and social sciences. In so doing, our staff have gained international recognition for being pioneers in fields such as design education and pedagogy, metadesign, human-computer interaction design, speculative and critical design, sustainability and the environment as well as the intersection between design, science and technology studies and social theory.

Our research practices are variously marked by their ongoing commitment to forms of social and political engagement and the radical rethinking of design as a key mediator in contemporary issues.

 

Meet the academics, practice tutors and researchers in the School of Design.