BA Hons Interior Architecture and Design

3 Years On Campus Bachelors Program

University of Portsmouth

Program Overview

This degree lets you reimagine and transform existing buildings, creating beautiful, functional interior spaces that are sustainable, inclusive, and sensitive to people and communities. It fits you well if you care about design, hands-on creativity, materiality, and want to combine artistic expression with technical understanding of buildings.

Curriculum Structure

Year One
You’ll start with modules like Design Communication and Portfolio (40 credits) where you learn to express your ideas through hand drawing, digital tools, models, sketches and visual presentations. Alongside, Design Fundamentals (40 credits) tasks you with creative design challenges to explore spatial concepts, user experience, collaboration, and design thinking. You’ll also study Histories, Theories and Matters of Concern (20 credits) to understand the ideas, cultural contexts, and debates that shape interior architecture and design, and Technology and Environment: Exploration (20 credits) to get hands-on with materials, construction basics, and how environment and climate connect with design.

Year Two
In the second year, the course becomes more specialised. You explore Design: Adaptive Re-Use (20 credits) which teaches you how to renew and repurpose old or existing buildings in eco-friendly, context-aware ways. Design: Interior Investigation (20 credits) asks you to engage deeply with real sites and complex briefs, producing detailed proposals; Technology and Materials (20 credits) furthers your understanding of how different materials and technologies work in interiors; and modules like Body and Interior Space and Communication: Creative Practice sharpen your skills in how people inhabit spaces, how light, materials, and form interact, and how to communicate atmosphere, detail and feel.

Final Year
Your final year is about bringing everything together. The Interior: Major Project (40 credits) is your signature work: you define the brief, research, design in detail, and present a project that reflects your style, research, skills and capacity. Alongside, you’ll do Design: Space, Detail, Atmosphere to refine your sense of detail, atmosphere, and spatial quality; History and Theory: Dissertation to develop your own critical thinking and research; Communication: Professional Identity which helps you prepare for the design profession—portfolios, branding, ethics, client work; and Material Expression to experimentally engage with materials and detail in meaningful ways.

Focus areas

Adaptive reuse of buildings; Spatial & material design; Sustainability & environment; Communication & portfolio development; Professional & industry experience; Atmosphere, detail & experience in interiors.

Learning outcomes

You will graduate able to: design interesting, functional and beautiful interior spaces; think sustainably and ethically about reuse, materials, and environment; communicate ideas clearly through visuals, models and presentation; conduct research and critical thinking about design history, theory, and context; manage the professional aspects of design, from client briefs to portfolios and identity; and adapt to different scales—from small interior detail to whole spatial environments.

Professional alignment (accreditation)

This course is not accredited by RIBA or ARB (since it's Interior Architecture & Design, not Architecture), so it does not provide the professional qualifications required for becoming a registered architect. However, it’s strongly respected in the design sector and will prepare you for roles in interior design, lighting, set design, brand consultancy, design management and related creative fields.

Reputation (employability rankings)

~94% of graduates are in work or further study 15 months after this course.
The course ranks in the Top 30 in the UK for student satisfaction (Times Higher Education 2024).

Experiential Learning (Research, Projects, Internships etc.)

When you enroll in this degree, you won't just study theory — you’ll get into design studios, work with real clients, try out production techniques, go on trips, and experience what it’s like to work in the real interior/architecture/design world. Some of the specific things:

Develop in a live studio environment: The course uses studio-based learning where you’ll be designing, modelling, drafting, critiquing — very similar to how design firms operate.
Use of fully furnished workshops: For model-making, prototyping, exploring materials. You'll work hands-on with materials like wood, metal, textiles, plastics, etc.
Real client projects: Through the Architecture Project Office students work with real clients to deliver designs.
Optional one-year placement: You can choose to spend a year working in industry, which boosts your employability and gives first-hand exposure.
Study trips, domestically and abroad: You’ll visit other cities or countries to see different architectural/interior environments, get inspired, observe how space, culture, context and materials interplay.

Key Facilities, Tools & Support

Here are the facilities, tools and support systems you will have access to; these are specific to this course and are quite strong:

Architecture Studios: Open-plan creative studio spaces fostering collaboration and enabling you to present, iterate and work in teams.
3D Workshops: For making physical models (wood, plastics, metal, plaster, etc.), prototyping, testing of materials.
Virtual Production & Mixed Reality Studio: Through the Centre for Creative and Immersive Extended Reality (CCIXR), you’ll have access to virtual/mixed reality tools helping you visualise, test and present your designs in immersive formats.
Fabric Workshop & Printmaking / Letterpress: If you're exploring textile, surface finishes or graphic/pattern/print work, you’ll have specialised facilities.
Open-access computing suites: Macs and PCs with Adobe Creative Suite, CAD tools, etc. for design presentation, digital modelling, rendering etc.

What You’ll Learn by Doing: Experiential Highlights

To make it very concrete, here’s how the learning is structured so you walk away with marketable, hands-on skills:

You’ll start with modules like Technology and Materials, where you test and explore material properties, sustainability, finishings etc.
You'll work on Design: Adaptive Re-Use modules (or similar) where you consider existing buildings, how they can be repurposed or redesigned — this gives practical experience in transformation, sustainability, and design thinking.
Through design communication and portfolio work, you’ll experiment with hand drawings, physical models, digital renders, and presentations.
The one-year placement gives you supervised, on-the-job experience in design firms, giving you exposure to real tasks, clients, workflow, working in teams.
Work with real clients via the in-house Architecture Project Office, meaning your work has a real end-user, constraints, feedback from external stakeholders.

Progression & Future Opportunities

When you complete this degree, you’ll be ready for roles such as:

Interior Designer
Lighting Designer
Brand / Visual Consultant
Set Designer or Display / Visual Merchandiser

Here’s why the program is strong and what to expect:

What the Degree Offers & Why It’s Valuable

University Services & Support
• Optional one-year placement (between second & final year, or after third) to get real work experience in design consultancies, studios, or self-employed work.
• In-house Architecture Project Office where you can work with real clients during your studies.
• A dedicated Careers and Employability team, plus “Creative Careers” support for design-sector roles. The support continues up to 5 years after graduation through the University’s Graduate Recruitment Consultancy.
Skills, Practical & Technical Training
• Hands-on workshops: fully furnished workshops for making models, working with materials, exploring lighting, detailing, both traditional and digital tools.
• Modules that give you experience with adaptive reuse, sustainable design, the environments of old & new buildings, constructing interiors in historic or existing contexts.
Industry Connections & Professional Exposure
• Strong links to industry: networking, exhibitions (Graduate Show, Interior Educators Exhibition & Awards), guest lectures.
• Study trips in UK & overseas which broaden your understanding of architecture & design in different contexts.
Graduate Outcomes & Satisfaction
• 94% of graduates in work or further study within 15 months after finishing the degree.
• The course is Top 30 in student satisfaction.
Long-Term Value & Accreditation
• While this course is not architecture in the RIBA/ARB sense, it still gives you strong credentials in the design world. Employers in interior architecture, lighting, set design value portfolios, creativity, technical skill and real-project experience.
• The ability to design with sustainability, inclusion, and re-use in mind adds value in the long run, as these are increasingly in demand.

Further Academic Progression:

After graduating with a BA (Hons) in Interior Architecture & Design, you could consider:

A Master’s degree in related fields: Interior Architecture, Spatial Design, Lighting Design, Exhibitions & Installations, Set Design, perhaps even Architecture or Urban Design (if requirements met).
Postgraduate specialization or certificate courses in Sustainable Design / Green Building, Historic Building Conservation, Digital / Parametric Design Tools, or Advanced Lighting & Theatre Design.
If interested in teaching, research, or academia, exploring an MA with dissertation or a research-based postgraduate route could be good.
Also possible: entrepreneurial path — set up your own design studio, consultancy, or work freelance — the course gives tools for self-promotion (portfolio, brand identity, professional practice modules).