About the Courses
Reducing energy consumption which contributes to global climate change and pollution is an international imperative, and the future architect must be equipped with the skills and vision to tackle this challenge both innovatively and responsibly. This course helps you master the knowledge and skills required to produce thermally comfortable, healthy, and habitable building designs while minimising energy consumptions. The curriculum embraces the interface between the environmental, economical and socio-cultural dimensions of sustainability in terms of building design and carbon neutrality.
You will join a community that is co-designing new ways of thinking and challenging architectural conventions through bold experimentation and boundless enquiry. This enquiry-led approach to education will encourage you to take creative risks and to learn from your mist
Reducing energy consumption which contributes to global climate change and pollution is an international imperative, and the future architect must be equipped with the skills and vision to tackle this challenge both innovatively and responsibly. This course helps you master the knowledge and skills required to produce thermally comfortable, healthy, and habitable building designs while minimising energy consumptions. The curriculum embraces the interface between the environmental, economical and socio-cultural dimensions of sustainability in terms of building design and carbon neutrality.
You will join a community that is co-designing new ways of thinking and challenging architectural conventions through bold experimentation and boundless enquiry. This enquiry-led approach to education will encourage you to take creative risks and to learn from your mistakes in a way that will shape your future design choices.
We provide state-of-the-art facilities for you to realise your ambitions, with workshops offering cutting-edge digital fabrication facilities, alongside a wide range of craft workshops, where you can innovate with materials and processes. We’ll help you to graduate with the tools to take your own personal and critical position on embracing the challenges of sustainability in the globalised architectural world.
Modules
Modules
Block 1: Methods for Sustainability Research
This module is designed to enhance your knowledge and understanding of the nature and scope of research, setting the foundation for the Dissertation module. You will be introduced to a rich curriculum supported by research design and strategies, methods of sustainable development to promote and encourage sustainability research. You will examine existing work in the areas of architecture and sustainability and analyse research techniques and sustainable approaches that you can use to further develop your own work.
Assessment: 3000-word report, 100%.
Block 2: Design Research Lab 1
This module provides the opportunity for you to learn and apply appropriate research skills and knowledge in relation to site analysis and the development of scheme proposals enhancing sustainable development. You will work in a small group to explore and critically evaluate complex issues in an existing building and produce an individual proposed scheme.
Assessment: Group work, 20% and Project, 80%.
Blocks 3 and 4: Building Performance Modelling
This module is designed to evaluate the environmental performance of buildings, exploring opportunities and methods to test detailed building projects delivered in the concurrent module—Design Research Lab 2. This will allow you to familiarise yourself with a range of tools and dynamic thermal simulation software. This will enable you to develop and test your design proposals at various design stages, starting with site considerations, through the technical design and development stage to the final scheme, ensuring sustainable outcomes. You will analyse the impact of building forms, construction materials, energy systems, ventilation, and shading on energy performance and thermal comfort. You will also identify improvement measures and parameters that affect energy use in buildings and compliance with Building Regulations.
Assessment: Coursework, 60% and Portfolio, 40%.
Blocks 3 and 4: Design Research Lab 2
The module provides you with the opportunity to investigate, analyse, and produce solutions for a building project using the knowledge and skills gained from previous modules. It explores, in more detail and depth, the boundaries of your strategic research proposals, producing building projects that embrace sustainable characteristics. It examines the application of relevant and appropriate planning policies, regulations, and legislation, which will also be used as a tool for justification of the design decisions made.
Assessment: Portfolio, 100%.
Blocks 5 and 6: Dissertation
Your learning will culminate in a 12000-word dissertation on a research topic of your own choosing.
Note: All modules are indicative and based on the current academic session. Course information is correct at the time of publication and is subject to review. Exact modules may, therefore, vary for your intake in order to keep content current. If there are changes to your course we will, where reasonable, take steps to inform you as appropriate.