BA (Hons) Theatre Design Course
Course Overview
Three Years, Full Time
Our undergraduate course is aimed at providing you with a
stimulating and challenging introduction to design theory and its
practical application in relation to performance. Our
well-established teaching team is made up of highly experienced
professionals who will provide you with tuition in a broad range of
practical skills including technical drawing, CAD, pattern cutting,
costume construction, millinery, tailoring, model making, puppetry
construction and manipulation, scenic art and props making.
Research and reflective practice will form an important part of
your work, and throughout the course you will participate in
historical and contextual studies, including lectures, seminars
field trips relating to the history of theatre, art, architecture,
design and costume and your own practice. The programme is highly
flexible, allowing you to concentrate on particular areas of
interest through advanced skills classes, conceptual projects and
performance-based work in your second and third years.
Preparing for Work
The programmes provide you with training in specialist areas of
set and costume design and realisation, equipping you with the
relevant knowledge and skills to maximise your employment potential
within the theatre, film, television and related performance-design
industries.
Our graduate employment rates are outstanding and our graduates
have a reputation for the high level of professionalism they are
able to demonstrate upon graduation. In recent years, RWCMD
students and graduates have also experienced great success in the
prestigious Linbury Prize for Theatre Design. Very recent graduates
are currently working as designers with companies such as The Royal
Ballet, Royal Northern Ballet, The Royal Shakespeare Company, West
Yorkshire Playhouse, No Fit State Circus, Diversions Dance, and the
BBC (Doctor Who, Torchwood). Our costume and set realisation
graduates are also working at the highest level within the
performance industries.
At the end of your course you will have the opportunity to
present your work to potential employers in exhibitions in Cardiff
and London.
In the autumn of 2010 our new campus will open and students will
be taught in a suite of world-class training and performing
facilities.The new facilities include a 160-seat Theatre and an
Exhibition Gallery to showcase the work of Theatre Design
students.
Production Work
In the unique setting of an active music and drama College, you
will be able to contribute to our busy programme of public
performances including mainstream and alternative theatre, opera
and musical theatre. The College has one large scale flexible
theatre space, one studio theatre, and regularly stages productions
at external professional venues, providing valuable opportunities
for you to work in a variety of performance contexts. As a
department, we also mount a major site specific production each
summer involving puppetry in performance.
Professional Links
All College productions and projects are supervised by designers
and design practitioners from within the industry, and you will
also work alongside professional theatre directors, reflecting the
practices and conditions of the professional environment.