DE6019 - Major Design Project

This module places an emphasis on you taking responsibility for conceiving, planning and responding to your own self-directed design project. This process will start with you presenting an initial interest or topic, which will be refined and developed through presentations and conversations with academic staff and your peer group. Frequent tutorials at the outset of the module will support you to build your initial plans into a substantial collection of research material. You will collate and analyse this research in a written and illustrated Contextual Review document. This document will conclude with your design brief and form the basis for your subsequent creative practice.

Regular tutorials and peer group presentations throughout the course of the module will help you to evaluate your progress and encourage you to respond to feedback and emergent design issues along the way. You will be expected to make frequent and regular use of the furniture and product design workshops throughout the module (to create prototypes) and will be supported in this environment by specialist cabinet-making, metal-smithing, machining and fabrication technicians. Whilst the particulars of each student’s project will vary across a year group, you will benefit from interim critiques at shared milestones, which will help to motivate and structure your progress and allow you to rehearse the articulation of your design process. As part of a creative community, where every student is pushing for excellence in their own practice, you will feel inspired and determined to achieve as much as possible before graduation.

This module is supported by tutor-led studio critiques, peer review sessions and one-to-one tutorials with academic staff. You will be supported with timetabled academic support both in the studio and workshop environment. The nature of a complex furniture and product project requires the workshop to be used not just for the mechanical realisation of existing concepts, but as a venue for the discussion and consideration of alternatives, with direct reference to works-in-progress. In addition to the timetabled slots with academic staff, additional workshop aspects of the module are supported by dedicated technical staff based in the cabinet-making, metal-smithing, machining and fabrication workshops.

Tutor Guided Independent Learning/Student Independent Learning will help you make constructive use of feedback received in the studio/workshop, and encourage you to direct your own learning needs. Such learning may include a range of activities such as; contextual reading; developing software skills and techniques; traditional media experimentation; photographic practice; practical skills-based learning.

The module is supported by a specific virtual learning environment (eLearning Portal) where you will find all the relevant documentation (briefs, module guides, assessment requirements etc.) The digital submission of interim works for tutorial guidance and formative assessment allows for expedient communication and the effective review of work whilst also utilising industry standard practices.

All modules at Northumbria include a range of reading materials that students are expected to engage with. The reading list for this module can be found at: http://readinglists.northumbria.ac.uk
(Reading List service online guide for academic staff this containing contact details for the Reading List team – http://library.northumbria.ac.uk/readinglists)

On successful completion of this module, you should be able to:

Knowledge & Understanding:

? Exhibit critical judgement, strategy and contextual awareness in the selection, definition and development of an appropriate design brief.
? Demonstrate an advanced knowledge of functional, aesthetic and contextual issues in the design of three-dimensional artefacts.
? Demonstrate a detailed knowledge of materials and processes in the realisation of a fully resolved prototypes.

Intellectual / Professional skills & abilities:

? Use prototyping techniques to effectively evaluate and communicate concepts and solutions.
? Demonstrate advance skills and creative ambition in the development of thoughtful and appropriate design solutions.
? Source, analyse and present a range of appropriate research material in an insightful and scholarly manner.

Personal Values Attributes:

? Show enterprise, entrepreneurship and/or contextual awareness in identifying and addressing opportunities and challenges.
? Engage autonomously in your studies, as evidenced by independent decision making and using self-critique to guide to your practice.

Interim critiques and individual tutorials provide regular formative feedback as part of the module’s teaching and learning strategy.

The module has 2 assessment tasks:

? A written and illustrated Contextual Review document and design brief (approx. 1500 words) will be submitted and summatively assessed in block 2 (10%). Feedback will be written and via one-to-one tutorial. This assessment address MLOs KU1, IP3 and PVA2.
? The outcomes of the major design project, including a research and development portfolio and physical artefacts will be submitted as a portfolio, for summative assessment at the end of block 3 (90%). This assessment address all MLOs.

Summative feedback for the module is written.

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This module can be understood as the culmination of a Furniture and Product Design student’s undergraduate studies. Taking all the knowledge, skills and contextual awareness they have spent the previous years developing, students are asked to research, write and respond to a self-directed design brief. A student’s completed project should be a testament to their learning and a valuable demonstration of their interests and abilities as they graduate into professional practice or further study. Previous assignments throughout the degree have enabled and urged students to take a position on what contemporary material culture should be like. This is an opportunity for a student to manifest these ideas through design practice and make artefacts that truly embody their values as a designer.

Students will learn how to research, contextualise and respond to a self-directed design project. Whilst the precise nature of each student’s project is individually defined, this module requires them to engage with the same cultural issues that have surrounded the furniture and product design of previous modules. Students are expected to utilise their knowledge of, and familiarity with, designing and manufacturing in the context of contemporary environmental, societal, ethical, aesthetic, commercial or technological issues. Students will begin by identifying an initial interest or opportunity for their practice and end by presenting an exhibition-ready artefact or collection of artefacts. The time and support provided along the way will enable students to create work with a sophistication and level of refinement beyond that of previous modules—they will be encouraged to work with ambition and pushed to develop insightful contributions to their chosen area of practice.