School of Art Design and Fashion

With its innovative teaching and close links to arts industries, there can be few environments more exhilarating for creative minds than UCLan's School of Art, Design and Fashion. Incorporating the fields of architecture, design, fashion and fine art, the School offers an extensive range of courses and opportunities to students and partners. Guided by expert teaching staff, our students are encouraged to develop their natural talents into a competitive skill set that can provide a foundation for a successful career.

About the School

UCLan prides itself on producing industry leaders and the impact of the School of Art, Design and Fashion and its students falls well beyond the campus limits. The high quality, professional work completed within the School is recognised by real-world businesses who regularly commission live projects from its courses.
The School’s greatest resource is its staff and we are proud of our vocational roots. We are dedicated to practice-based, industry-led teaching and the majority of our staff are either still engaged in commercial practice or have recently moved into teaching from relevant workplace environments. We work with industry to make sure that we produce students who have the knowledge and skills to find employment in their specialist areas.
Our students benefit from an array of cutting-edge facilities and equipment, including new studio spaces and facilities for Architecture, recently-updated facilities for fine art in the Hanover Building, and fully-contained studios and workspaces for design and fashion in the Victoria Building. In addition, we have numerous spaces for our frequent exhibition events and shows, including the School’s PR1 Gallery, which hosts a weekly rotation of exhibitions.
Our industrial links continue to grow in strength which ensures our teaching and courses are relevant, highly contemporary and meet the future needs of the sector. We work with a number of businesses and organisations, these include: Umbro, Durex, LG, the Lowry, BBC, Granada, St Catherine’s Hospice, SMD, Dyson, NHS, M&S, BAE Systems, Burberry to name but a few.

Our Courses

With innovative teaching and close links to arts industries, the School offers an excellent environment for creative minds, with a range of courses in the following subject areas.

Contemporary Gallery Spaces

The School of Art, Design and Fashion boasts two gallery spaces giving students an opportunity to work alongside professional artists, gain live work experience, promotes networking and engages students in their chosen field.

Integrated Placement Years

For over 30 years, the School has been preparing and supporting students who undergo long-term (sandwich) industrial placements at design, fashion and promotion based companies across the UK and overseas.

Design at UCLan

Design at UCLan has an established heritage and creative thinking is embedded into everything we do and everything we teach for design postgraduate students they express their mastery of this philosophy through their practice and research with the MA show as the hallmark of their excellence.

Art and Design Saturday Club

UCLan’s Art and Design Saturday Club (part of the National Saturday Club) is a programme of exciting and engaging creative workshops exploring a variety of art and design processes. This enables students aged 13 to 16 to extend and explore their creativity through an assortment of materials and media that will cover drawing, painting, ceramics, printmaking and sculpture. This initiative is FREE for Club Members and limited places are available each year. The Saturday Club is a unique chance for Club Members to build an art and design portfolio, with no pressure of assessment. Members have the opportunity to experience and use state-of-the-art facilities and receive expert tuition from UCLan tutors and student ambassadors. Find out more about UCLan’s Art and Design Saturday Club: www.uclan.ac.uk/saturdayclub

Research

Much of the research within the School of Art, Design and Fashion is based on a genuine desire to tackle aspects of societal challenge facing local communities globally:

the need for people to belong and to have their cultural contribution recognised;
the need for cities to change to meet technological and economic shifts while taking various and varying communities with them on the journey and importantly;
the need to play a central part in an ecologically sustainable strategy for the global built environment.

Research within the School is structured into four groups, each infused with a passionate belief in art and design as a tool for change.

Making Histories Visible

Silicates Research Unit

In Certain Places

Collaborative Engagements

Art Professor wins the 2017 Turner Prize

Lubaina Himid

Professor Lubaina Himid, MBE from the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) has been crowned the winner of the 2017 Turner Prize. The contemporary art professor, from the Faculty of Culture and the Creative Industries, was chosen over Hurvin Anderson, Andrea Buttner, and Rosalind Nashashibi for the sought after award, which is considered to be one of the most prestigious international visual arts awards.

“It’s great to win, especially as so many people in Preston were rooting for me. It will make a huge difference to my profile and give a platform to the issues I want to champion.”

Find out more

Facilities and Resources

The UCLan School of Art, Design and Fashion is defined by its commitment to quality. Our versatile state-of-the-art facilities are utilised by students across our variety of subject areas and come supported by fully trained technical staff to assist in creating your vision, the possibilities are endless.