Kingston upon Thames, United Kingdom
DURATION
3 Years
LANGUAGES
English
PACE
Full time
APPLICATION DEADLINE
30 Jun 2025
EARLIEST START DATE
Sep 2025
TUITION FEES
GBP 9,535 / per year *
STUDY FORMAT
On-Campus
* UK students| international: £19,200 for the first year
Key Summary
Introduction
Develop the skills and understanding needed to work in the creative and cultural sector.
As part of Kingston School of Art, you’ll benefit from joining a creative community where collaborative working and critical practice are encouraged. Our workshops and studios are open to all disciplines, enabling students and staff to work together, share ideas and explore multi-disciplinary making.
With an ethos of Thinking Through Making, you'll use our studio spaces and facilities to experiment and explore new ways to push the boundaries. Kingston School of Art's industry-standard, cutting-edge 3D workshops, studios and making spaces are accessible to all students. Other facilities include our digital media labs, and printmaking, film and photography studios.
On the Art Direction degree, you'll also become part of our student -powered creative agency, StudioKT1. Working on exciting paid live briefs from creative companies such as Unilever and Mozilla Foundation, you'll gain the commercial and organisational skills and insight needed to thrive in the creative and cultural sector.
Why choose this course
This course prepares you for a career in art direction in the creative industries. You will develop practical, conceptual and analytical skills in visual communication to create effective advertising and visual identities for organisations and projects.
Throughout the course, you will learn to visualise, collaborate, experiment and project manage as you work on real-world projects with other students and industry professionals. You will also develop your knowledge of the creative industries, exploring topics such as design thinking, branding and strategy for creative organisations.
You’ll have opportunities to explore your creative freedom with non-commercial creative projects. In addition, you'll be encouraged to develop your expertise in current design approaches, techniques, media, and applications. For example, branding, editorial, interactive design, packaging and 3D design, advertising, information design, digital moving image, sustainable and experiential design. You’ll also practise skills and techniques such as typography, photography, moving image, printmaking, rapid proto-typing, analysis and research, human factors, presentation, interactive and graphic software.
Gallery
Admissions
Scholarships and Funding
Scholarships and bursaries
We want to ensure anyone with potential and drive has the opportunity to study with us, no matter their background or financial situation. That's why each year, we provide a number of bursaries to help our undergraduate students gain their degree.
- The Kingston bursary
- Bursaries for care leavers
- Bursaries for estranged students
- Bursaries for young adult carers
- Bursaries for Sanctuary Scholars
- Chancerygate Foundation bursary
- Salutem scholarships
- AVSH scholarship
Curriculum
This Art Direction degree develops visual communication skills and enhances your creative judgement. You will manage creative projects and learn how to deliver the visual language of an organisation or client's advertising or content needs. Through a combination of in-house and live briefs you will discover your creative self and your future role in industry.
Year 1
Year 1 is common to all our creative and cultural industries courses. You will explore visual communication techniques, use of design software, storytelling and design thinking. You will learn individually and as part of a team of creative partners and professionals. You will examine the management and strategy of creative enterprises, and the history and development of art and design practice.
Core modules
- Thinking about ideas
- Navigating Industry
- Creative Journeys
- The Tools of Writing
Year 2
Year 2 examines art direction in depth. The modules and projects will develop your skills and understanding of what art direction brings to creative enterprises. This will include interpreting briefs and transforming the ideas of a company into a coherent visual identity to communicate with key audiences.
You will study conceptualisation and visualisation, visual narratives and storyboarding, artwork commission, branding, entrepreneurship, managing risk, project management and strategy.
You can choose to apply for a summer internship at the end of Year 2 to gain valuable experience and increase your employability.
Core modules
- Customer Mindfulness
- Creative Project Management
- Live case study
- Art Direction
Optional Year
You have the option to take an additional year to study abroad.
Year 3
Year 3 examines art direction in depth.
You will study cultural entrepreneurship and explore ways of building a sustainable independent career. You will further your knowledge and skills around art direction
The major project in your final year will be a visual project, business or marketing plan, or consultancy project for a company.
You will research and identify a current challenge around art direction and provide visual communication solutions that are tailored for the chosen audience. You will be challenged and guided by your supervisors to achieve your potential.
Core modules
- Art Direction 2
- Culturepreneurship
- The Major Project
Program Tuition Fee
Career Opportunities
After you graduate, you'll be ready to apply your expertise to the creative industries by combining your understanding of art and design with your knowledge of commercial practices.
Embedded within every course curriculum and throughout the whole Kingston experience is our Future Skills programme. Future Skills is a response to the evolving demands of modern day employment. As a result, it will play a role in shaping you to become a future-proof graduate, providing you with the skills most valued by employers. For example, problem-solving, digital competency and adaptability.
As you progress through your degree, you'll learn to navigate, explore and apply these graduate skills. You’ll also learn to demonstrate and articulate to employers how future skills give you the edge.