A short description of each unit and what you can expect.
Year 1
Unit 1 - Introduction to Costume for Theatre and Screen
This unit is an introduction to your course, the college and the university.
Unit 2 - Designing and making 1
- Short projects in research, costume design, construction and exploration of character
- Lectures on costume theory that will introduce a contextual understanding of dress and its impact on society
Unit 3 - Designing and making 2
This unit will help you understand the specialism options of Design and Interpretation in preparation for you to make your choice between the 2.
- Further projects to develop your design and making skills
- Costume related lectures to help you improve your subject knowledge
Unit 4 - Exploring ideas
This unit builds on the broad range of technical processes and key ideas you have been introduced to.
- An introduction to ideas, debates and critical approaches associated with the uses of costume
- To work with a real body and creating performance
- To make your specialism choice of Design or Interpretation. Projects in this unit will support a Design or Interpretation progression into the second year
- To work on your reflective journal
- Written work
Unit 5 - Who are you? Establishing practice
In this unit you will work collaboratively in groups to develop, design and produce a fully realised outcome for presentation in a live installation.
- To use a set text that will allow you to broadly explore time, place and context.
- To work with a real body to create a performance for an invited audience.
- Tutorials and technical workshops
- To work on your reflective journal
- Written work
Year 2
Unit 6 - Practice as laboratory
This specialist unit gives you the opportunity to build upon the knowledge and skills established. You will work on a more challenging project within your chosen costume specialism.
- An introduction to more advanced skills and working methods
- To establish professional working practices including fitting, form and function
- To carry out research to support your 2D and 3D constructed work
- Lectures, talks, seminars and tutorials
- To work on your reflective journal
Unit 7 - Collective and collaborative practices
This unit aims to introduce you to different ways in which collaborative working can focus and enhance your own creative strengths. This unit has 3 core purposes:
- To engage with fellow students with different practices and interests in a collaborative project
- To engage with external audiences, participants or institutions to consider new contexts for your work
- To develop your creative attributes to enable you to take on future challenges in a variety of contexts
Unit 8 - Where in the world? 1
- A short practical project specific to your specialism
- An industry awareness programme that will focus on exploring and defining a context for your own practice
- To engage with and respond to broader concepts and themes. These might include, but are not limited to body, gender, genre, agency, authenticity, movement, audience, spatiality
- To attend and review performances and events
- To apply for work placements to be undertaken in unit 9
- To work on your CV and professional portfolio
Unit 9 - Where in the world? 2
This unit has 2 elements:
- Self-directed project - will give you the opportunity to select what and how you want to learn
- Work placement - will give you an insight into the diverse career opportunities available in costume
Year 3
Unit 10 - Finding your voice: portfolio design, crafting research skills, career planning
The work generated for your final year project will be self-directed and involve extended pieces of work. The unit has 3 elements:
- Research portfolio - a visual and reflective project that demonstrates your research voice within your studio work
- Professional portfolio - development of a portfolio for potential employment that articulates your aesthetic and personal identity
- Dissertation - a research project which can be written, filmed or presented
Unit 11 - Show your work: independent practice
This final unit enables you bring together all the ideas and learning from the course.
- To continue a self-directed programme of practice and related research
- To prepare your portfolio to help you enter the costume design profession
- To present work in the college degree show
Optional Diploma between year 2 and 3
Between year 2 and 3 you can opt to undertake the Diploma in Professional Studies or the Diploma in Creative Computing.