Awards
Target Award
Programme Offerings
Part-Time
Educational Aims of the Course
In a world of rapidly rising and migrating urban populations there is a palpable need for smarter, more inclusive approaches to city planning, adaptation and spatial design. Based within the School's Architecture subject area, this programme aims to enable practitioners and scholars to transform the field of urban design through critical thinking and creative practice. Nourished by the association with the University's European Institute for Urban Affairs and the links with the Liverpool Biennial, which every two years delivers an international programme of exhibitions and projects that lead to a rediscovery of the city, the course positions Liverpool in each centre, as example of a creative city with a rich heritage of civic design and creative urban engagement. It also has connections with nationally recognised urban design practitioners, local authority planning and urban design departments and international academic partners. This is a studio based programme, linking theory, practice and the urban experience. Learning takes place predominantly through the creative and critical exploration of research focused urban design projects. The course’s graduates will be employable in professions in a range of fields related to the growth and liveability of cities.
The programme aims to confront students with contemporary and future urban issues such as climate change, biodiversity and landscape urbanism, healthy living, intensification and population growth, affordable housing in order to develop urban design skills that apply to a range of locations and issues and to enable them to create liveable places for tomorrow. The intention is to provide them with: 1. Knowledge of the historical and cultural context of urban design as a field of inquiry and practice.
2. Understanding and the ability to evaluate change in physical, economic, social and cultural milieu in the context of inner-city sites.
3. Understanding of the master planning process and the use of design codes, in combination with the implementation of urban theories to foster holistic consideration of methods and practices of urban design in the UK and internationally.
4. Understanding of the nature and processes of urban residential development and neighbourhood design.
5. Appreciation and incorporation of principles of sustainable development into urban projects.
6. The ability to engage in urban design discourse and practice within multi-disciplinary and cross-cultural contexts.
7. The ability to appraise and resolve issues identified in the exploration of regeneration and development proposals for towns and cities.
8. The ability to creatively generate, evaluate and communicate urban design proposals across multiple scales.
9. The ability to explore global real-life planning and development issues in-person through live projects.
Teaching, Learning and Assessment
Teaching is predominantly through a series of briefings, thematic lectures, seminars and (group and individual) tutorials. Learning is consolidated through hands on skills workshops in technical areas within the School or Faculty. Students formally present urban research, analysis and design work at key stages for formative feedback and peer review from tutors and external critics. The course is primarily studio based and there is an emphasis on independent learning. Students are encouraged to respond to the integrative studio culture, and develop an atmosphere where they will benefit from each other's diverse disciplinary backgrounds.
Three main streams structure teaching, learning and assessment, with emphasis in the holistic consideration of theory, design, practice and legislation aspects.
The course is structured so that theoretical investigations inform design queries. Design starts with group work involving MArch students, and the individual input follows. That design work is revisited through design reviews and tutorial discussions in order to reflect on the development of sustainable communities. The work is presented via drawings, sketches, essays and reports and happens during Semester 1 and Semester 2 (in full time and part time participation to the course).
Students participate to real life projects too, working in groups with local stakeholders and non-profit organisations acting as 'clients' where they have to develop a brief, provide design alternatives, present and discuss them with the client. This allows to develop pragmatic reports with design work as well as costing and safety considerations; hence responding to practical and legislative facets of the profession.
Finally, students are given the tools to conduct research via methodological tools and presentations on salient aspects of Urban Design. Whilst it is impossible to cover all historic or theoretical knowledge, the intention is to tackle current issues, using historic references to nourish the investigations that students are invited to undertake. They are then free to decide whether the culmination of the above will materialise as a dissertation or a documented design report, hence allowing orientation either towards theory (via design) or design (via theory).