Master of Architecture (MArch)

Overview

Year one introduces you to research-led design. It will be a year of unpacking, rethinking, experimenting and discovering areas of specialised interest, which may subsequently become distinctive characters of your thesis in year two.

The year is supported by more ambitious skills workshops – not based on any one area of specialism, but on a variety of developed approaches to learning and research that will help you explore areas of design pertinent to your own aptitudes and interests.

The year includes a field trip at the end of term one, generally abroad to an unusual, challenging destination.

Research and Communications (15 credits)

One of the first modules in this course, along with Contemporary Practice, its purpose is three-fold. you will:

1. Learn appropriate advanced research, archive retrieval and communication skills necessary for studying at postgraduate level
2. Plan a study strategy for the whole course, in which you examine your options, particularly with regards to the Dissertation in the second half of the first year and for the Comprehensive Design Thesis in the final year
3. Study the relationship between design and realisation, and investigate contemporary issues through prototyping methods using a group design and making project

Contemporary Practice (30 credits)

Brings you up to date with what is happening in architecture, masterplanning, urbanism, urban design and art. The intention is to start the preparation for your professional participation in the construction industry by familiarising you with current design thinking.

Delivered in participation with leading active practitioners, the objective is that it should stimulate and inspire you to investigate further some of the items studied here in the Dissertation and the Comprehensive Design Thesis, and consider what the future may hold.

Making Places (30 credits)

Introduces you to research-led architectural design. Based on the field trip, it is an opportunity to dismantle and rethink what you have learned so far as a designer. Through deep exploration and experimentation, you will discover areas of specialised interest that will broaden and help to establish your approach to design. You will set the design and research objectives for a small project, which you will design in much greater detail than you have hitherto.

Design Technology (15 credits)

Run in combination with Making Places, this studies the application of advanced and innovative technologies to a design project. The areas covered include: sustainable environmental design, single and compound structural approaches, surface materiality, including new materials and new applications of materials. You will also study technical design and constructional techniques, including prototyping, parametrics and robotics. You will discover the potential new design opportunities offered by these techniques.

Dissertation (30 credits)

Facilitates a critical understanding of how knowledge is advanced through research to produce clear, logically argued, illustrated and written work relating to architectural culture, theory, technology and design.

Alternative methods of expression are encouraged including use of moving images and web-based media. Using material learned in Contemporary Practice, as well as Making Places and Design and Technology, you plan what you will do for the Comprehensive Design Thesis in year two, and choose a relevant aspect of it to research and write about using methodologies learned in the Research and Communications unit.

Overview

Year two of this MArch Architecture master's degree course comprises a year-long integrated design thesis (CDT) as a celebration of the Department’s essential academic position, which is about the essence of building in specific physical and cultural settings.

The pedagogic model is less about teaching as it is about engagement with specialists from the building professions, through a self-motivated process that readies you rigorously for practice. With a site anywhere in the world and a brief initiated by you to suit your own interests after deep research in year one, the CDT comprehensively demonstrates your abilities across the multi-stranded demands involved in the creation of a building project.

The final year also includes Practice, Management and Law (PML) in preparation for participation in the profession and anticipating part three. It is intended that the overall portfolios should be published as books at the end of the course.

Practice Management and Law (30 credits)

Covers knowledge of the management and legal framework required for professional architectural practice at RIBA Part 2. Using input from built environment consultants, and synchronized with the Comprehensive Design Thesis, it includes: roles of professional bodies, RIBA Plan of Work, RIBA + ARB Codes of Professional Conduct, International Ethics Standards, BIM, technical drawing layer conventions, professional contracts and frameworks, PII, the methodologies, economics and businesses of building development practices and entrepreneurship, project procurement, office organisation, consultants and constructors, planning and building control and related regulations, building contract types, and business management.

The module concludes with a report undertaking a substantial investigation to address current and near future issues concerning methodologies of project development and procurement within the systems of appointment in relation to demand and resource and skill availability.

Comprehensive design Thesis (90 credits)

This is the final, year-long, design project in the course, before you register as an architect (after part three in the UK). You will demonstrate your ability to integrate the broad range of knowledge and skills required to imaginatively design a complex building project. It forms the principal content of your portfolio.

The CDT is an integrated design project in which you comprehensively research and design a building project. You propose a brief and site and show evidence of your research that led you to the project type and location. You will undertake an in-depth study of site, client/user, planning context, social context, climate, new technologies, new live issues needing research, and of precedents related to programme and site. The guidelines are highly flexible, allowing maximum choice from refurbishment to master planning, but ensuring that the RIBA/ARB Criteria are addressed and employability interests met.

The design process reflects real-world practice by following the RIBA Plan of Work. Submissions include: a full planning application and attendant information, partial detailed structural, environmental and constructional design, and final high-level presentation of the completed project. This is accompanied by a reflective report on the process in which evidence of research study around the subject area for each of the stages is shown, as well as a commentary on how the new and experimental proposals address live issues.

Together, the design proposal and the reflective report, as well as the Dissertation, form a research thesis, which, possibly along with your other work on the course, will be arranged for publication as a book. It is intended that not only should this document provide compelling evidence of your employability, but also give you the basis and option for further research leading to PhD and beyond.

To complement your own research, client and user interviews etc, teaching includes representation from industry with masterclasses from leading architectural practitioners, along with lectures and tutorials by visiting practicing specialist consultants on strategic planning, means of escape, structures, environment and construction, so that you learn how to manipulate these standard relationships in the profession, which will enrich your design. Leading architectural practitioners will also be involved in interim and final reviews.

Applicable to all candidates, including Ravensbourne alumni.

• A 2.2 with 50% (10% above pass) minimum in the final-year major design project in a first architecture degree, either prescribed by ARB or similar to an ARB/RIBA Part 1 course in the case of non-ARB prescribed UK, EU and Overseas courses.
• Graduates with non-ARB prescribed first architecture degrees who wish to register in the UK as an architect would have to submit their portfolios to ARB for examination at some stage; though this is not a requirement for entry to the MArch.
• While advisable, practical experience is not required for entry to the MArch, though applicants should note that a minimum of 24 months of logged professional experience are required to undertake Part 3 examinations and to register as an architect in the UK; of which, 12 months may be completed before the completion of the MArch.

Check the portfolio requirements for the programme.

Selection criteria, interview and portfolio

We welcome applicants who are able to demonstrate their abilities through the submission of a relevant portfolio showing their skills, abilities and suitability for the course.

If your application is successful, you will be invited to an interview.

Non-EEA/EU

In order to be eligible for a course, you will need to be a competent speaker and writer of English. This applies if you are from the European Union or from a country outside the EU. You need to provide us with an IELTS or equivalent English language qualification demonstrating a minimum of 5.5 or CEFR Level B2 in each component. 

If you are applying as a Tier 4 student, please read the English language requirements or contact [email protected] for more detailed information. 

Learn more: entry requirements per country

Whether you are a UK resident or a non-EEA/EU national, you will need to apply directly to Ravensbourne University London via our Online Applicant Portal. Each course and mode option has a unique link to apply. 

Simply select and click your chosen start date and mode via the 'Apply now' dropdown at the top of this page, and you will be directed to the appropriate page inside the portal. 

Learn more: how to apply for a postgraduate course

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• Admissions queries: +44 (0) 20 3045 0674
• International queries: [email protected]
• General information: +44 (0) 20 3040 3500

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