Interior Design BA(Hons)

Delve into the world of built spaces, interior environments and the people who inhabit them. Through live projects and industry partnerships, you’ll tackle the issues facing modern society. Engaging in innovative thinking and collaborative working, you’ll be well placed to join the industry’s next generation of creative talent.
Location | Falmouth Campus |
---|---|
Course duration | 3 years |
Attendance | Full-time |
UCAS code | W252 |
Apply now
Course overview
Interior design utilises colour, pattern and materiality to create memorable interior atmospheres, considering the aesthetics, psychology and functionality of design.
This hands-on interior design course will give you the opportunity to explore commercial, residential and decorative spaces, including the hospitality sector. With an eye to the future, the opportunity to undertake competitive industry internships will help you to secure your footing in the industry.
You will:
- Work with exciting industry partners such as DSK, MIX Magazine and Sanders Studios
- Hone your skills and pitch ideas to compete for a coveted industry placement
- Negotiate your own design projects and develop an individual design philosophy as you consider your future role in industry
- Engage with the creative and collaborative work ethic of the future through interdisciplinary projects
- Discover new ways of expressing yourself through our studio culture, IT suites and workshops
- Draw inspiration from our extensive materials library
- Have the opportunity to go on study trips such as Milan Furniture Fair and Stockholm Design Week*
* Due to ongoing restrictions on travel caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and changes to the UK's study abroad programme due to Brexit, we cannot guarantee study exchanges as a part of this course.
Course details
Through this interior design degree, you'll develop the skills to become a confident, well informed and industry-connected designer of the future.
You will gain a strong understanding of how to produce a comprehensive and innovative design scheme in the area of your choice. Through collaborative and interdisciplinary projects, including live projects, you'll grow a broad range of creative skills, become a critical thinker and have the opportunity to bring your ideas to life.
During your internship, you'll make valuable industry connections, supporting and facilitating your path as a professional through to employment. Project work will develop your technical skills in our multi-material workshops on campus, as well as exploring new digital environments through VR and AR technologies.
This year is all about learning to think, draw and model interior space. We'll look at every aspect of interiors, from the decorative through to commercial interiors and interior architecture – supported by history and theories to develop your wider knowledge. You'll also visit sites, go on international field trips, make in the workshop and learn how to communicate ideas, both by hand and digitally.
Modules
Interior Design Principles 1
With a focus on the commercial and decorative interior, you will be introduced to the core language, principles and skills that underpin the discipline through short exploratory design primers from a user, client and site perspective.
Contextual Studies 1 / Seminal Interiors
You'll consider critical, conceptual and communication skills in relation to the evolution of, and influences of, the interior design profession. Including a practical workshop focused on printmaking.
Interior Design Principles 2
This module offers an introduction to the architectural interior and the site-specific skills relevant to adaptive re-use, reimagining real interiors and applying design theory with an understanding of context and history.
Contextual Studies 2 / Architectural Interiors
You'll gain an understanding of the theories that relate to context, adaptive re-use and place-making, cultivating critical thinking and communications skills. Practical workshops focus on detail design.
Building your real-world experience, you'll collaborate on projects with industry partners to understand how to complete a project to industry standards. You'll develop your CAD skills, as well as exploring technical detailing, project management and cost analysis.
Interdisciplinary challenges will hone your transferable skills as well as allowing you to develop great team working tactics. Through a broad range of projects, we'll expose you to the wider areas of the industry, enabling you to consider which might suit your personal career path. You'll also have the opportunity to study or gain work experience abroad in countries like Sweden, Italy, Germany and Australia.
Modules
Design Innovation
In this module, you'll work on specific content through external briefs, live clients, design competitions and collaborative team projects. You'll be encouraged to challenge current thinking, typically through user-led design, investigation of interior brands and community projects.
Professional skills 1 / Employability
This module places emphasis on creating a professional identity, gaining work experience through internships or placements and through specialist employability workshops in professional networking skills, graphics and IT.
Design Identity
You'll engage in projects to develop your understanding of a chosen pathway: decorative, commercial or architectural. Industry partnerships help you to develop and connect with current industry practice. Projects introduce digital resources such as 3D printing and laser-cutting.
Professional Skills 2 / Employability
At this stage, you'll develop your academic writing and referencing skills, linked to graphic and visual outputs, to support your research into a current design issue.
You'll build a specialism, and create projects and a portfolio of work aimed at your ideal job. The Interior Design degree course finishes with a degree show and a dissertation, giving you the platform and tools to launch your career.
Modules
Exploratory Design Project
This module prioritises a personal design direction or interest within interior design. It encourages you to develop innovative, creative solutions and rethink the future of interior design. It's about understanding how you use the design process, develop transferable skills and become an independent learner.
Critical Report / Contextual and Industry Focus
This is about honing your critical research and writing skills in the development of a body of work that reflects upon your personal practice and interior design theory.
Comprehensive Design Project
This final project culminates in a degree show of your work that explores the physicality of built space through a greater understanding of detail, light, colour, materiality and interior specification. It aims to create a showcase of your work for future employers and life after university.
The modules above are those being studied by our students, or proposed new ones. Programme structures and modules can change as part of our curriculum enhancement and review processes. If a certain module is important to you, please discuss it with the Course Leader.
From module information to course aims and assessment criteria, discover the full course details
We are making changes to our curriculum framework for courses starting in 2022. Modest amendments to our course module structure will provide you with new opportunities to collaborate and co-create with students from across disciplines during your studies.
This course page will be updated when these changes have been finalised and applicants will be notified.
How you'll learn
You'll begin by exploring everything from homes to healthcare environments, to architectural spaces, before deciding which direction most inspires you. We'll take you through the design process so that you can start to develop exciting concepts for specific users and places, as well as understanding how to develop a scheme through materials, colour and lighting in the creation of truly experiential design.
Negotiated projects will allow you to define your own interests and personal direction within the field of interior design. This will be supplemented by the growth of more career-focused skills through master classes, live projects and industry collaborations that will ensure you are ready for the creative workplace.
At Falmouth, we use a 'digitally enhanced learning & teaching' approach. Your experience will always be predominantly in-person, including seminars, tutorials and studio teaching, with some, more targeted elements, being online either live (synchronous) or pre-recorded (asynchronous). You can read more here.
How you'll spend your time
Year | Timetabled teaching and learning activity | Guided independent study |
---|---|---|
1 | 35% | 65% |
2 | 30% | 70% |
3 | 25% | 75% |
How you'll be assessed
Year | Written exams | Practical exams | Coursework |
---|---|---|---|
1 | 0% | 0% | 100% |
2 | 0% | 0% | 100% |
3 | 0% | 0% | 100% |
The above percentages relate to 2019/2020 data.
Assessment methods
- Continuous assessment with no formal examinations
- A combination of visual, verbal and written assignments including project work, essays and seminar presentations
- Final-year dissertation and exhibition
Staff
Your tutors include architects, interior designers and IT specialists. They’ve worked in places like Singapore, Hong Kong, Sydney and London, run their own studios, and designed for clients like Monsoon and Marks & Spencer.
Some members of staff only teach on specific modules, and your course might not feature every member shown here.

Fay Freeman
Course Leader, BA(Hons) Interior Design
Fay Freeman is the new Course Leader for BA(Hons) Interior Design having joined the University ...

Jean Whitehead
Senior Lecturer Interior Design
Jean, a senior lecturer in Interior Design, joined Falmouth University in 2004 and is a graduate of ...

Amanda Losasso
Lecturer
Amanda is a Lecturer in Interior Design having joined the university’s interiors team in 2013.&nbs...

Stuart Watt
Lecturer, Interior Design
Graduating from Napier University, Edinburgh with BSc Hons Industrial Design 2:1. Spent a year worki...

Iain Stewart-Tull
Associate Lecturer
Iain graduated from the Mackintosh School of Architecture with a master of architecture degree and w...

Megan Sadler
Associate Lecturer
Megan Sadler is an Associate Lecturer at Falmouth University, joining the team in 2018. She has work...

Jennifer Neal
Associate Lecturer
Jennifer graduated from Falmouth University in 2010 and is delighted to be back teaching here as her...

Caireen O'Hagan
Associate Lecturer
I am a practising architect and interior designer. I’ve worked for over 20 years in Glasgow, Bosto...

Matthew Abbott
Senior Technician, Digital Skills, School of Architecture Design and Interiors
Matthew joined Falmouth University in 1998 as a student on BA(Hons) 3D Design and has the distinctio...
Facilities
- Digital Print Centre with large format printing and scanning
- Laser cutting facilities
- 3D milling and rapid prototyping facilities
- Wood and metal workshops
- Printmaking facilities
- Materials Library
- Time based media resources
- Library books and journal resources specific for Architecture and Interior Design

Art & Design Facilities
Primarily located at the Falmouth Campus in a subtropical garden, our studios and workshop facilitie...

Library Facilities
Offering extensive collections, our two libraries provide a wealth of digital resources, magazines, ...

Sports Centre
Our Sports Centre, on Penryn Campus, includes a spacious gym with up to 90 of the latest, new statio...
Second year internship programme
“Working with Interior Design students at Falmouth University enables us in industry to not only keep track of junior talent to benefit us in the long run, but it also allows us to support in honing their skills to better prepare them for entering the design world. University degrees are a great start to what we hope will be a long future for many design students, but it can only teach so much.
The course is structured in a way to give breadth and knowledge and a broad overall sense of what the design industry is all about. With first hand connections we support in filling the gaps and keeping the conversation fresh. It’s a great privileged and honourable opportunity for us working in agencies to use our experience, much of which is varied to mentor these students so that they are fully prepared, excited and ready to start their careers as post graduates. After all they are our future”
– Sammi Burden, Creative Director, Bull Design
What our graduates do
Our graduates have worked as:
- Creative Designer at Imagination, a global experience company
- Interior Designers at Conran Design Studio, David Collins Studio and Pendennis Superyachts
- Brandscape Designer at Studio Egret West
See a selection of exploratory design portfolios from our recent Interior Design BA(Hons) graduates.

Graduates pool their skills to design positive community change
28 October 2021
A team of Interior Design graduates are helping to transform a disused pub into a community space in...

Graduate returns to Falmouth to embed sustainability into design curriculum
18 June 2021
Megan Coe graduated from BA(Hons) Interior Design in 2019, and has since been working in Cornwall fo...

Graduate is creating luxury interiors and connecting people
14 May 2021
Interior Design graduate Ella is currently working for Mehrai Design, a London-based ...

Graduate designing for Sybarite
18 March 2021
Interior design graduate Riko Sobukawa left Falmouth in 2016 and is currently working for architectu...

Graduate designing modular apartments in Sweden
05 February 2021
Interior Design graduate Jake is currently working for Adept Consulting as a structural designer –...

Graduate designing luxury yachts
13 January 2021
Interior Design graduate Emily is currently working as Creative Designer for Princess Yachts, a lead...

Graduate Designs at the Young Vic
03 August 2020
Interior Design graduate Phyllys Egharevba graduated in 2018, she is currently working freelance as ...

Graduate Designing Social Spaces that Create Connections
03 June 2020
Interior Design graduate Kieran O’Shea is currently working for Amarelle - a team of exp...

Graduate Designing Exclusive Interiors
30 April 2020
Megan Sandalls graduated Interior Design in 2018. She is now a Senior Interior Designer at Iroka, an...

Graduate is Design Lead at Conran
16 April 2020
Tabitha Organ graduated Interior Design BA(Hons) in 2015. She is currently working for Conran and Pa...
How to apply
Apply via UCAS
Ready to join us? You can apply for September 2022 through UCAS Apply and Track. You'll need to reference the course and University code (F33).
Apply now
Applying as an international student?
International students can apply for a course through UCAS, via an agent or directly with the university. For more information about how to apply as an international student, visit our International applications page.
Course route | UCAS code |
---|---|
Interior Design BA(Hons) three year degree | W252 |

Application advice & interview information
Go to ToolkitWhat we're looking for
We want someone who:
- Researches and considers the ideas behind visual elements
- Is enthusiastic about the subject
- Gives a good portfolio presentation
- Can discuss issues individually and in groups
- Is open-minded
Fees, costs & funding
Tuition fees
Annual tuition fee | Student |
---|---|
£9,250 per year | Full-time UK |
£17,460 per year | Full-time EU/international |
Tuition fees are set annually and are subject to review each year. The University may therefore raise tuition fees in the second or subsequent years of a course, in line with inflation and/or the maximum permitted by law or Government policy. Students will be notified of any changes as soon as possible.
Typical course costs
- £200-£400 - Recurring annual costs
- £20-£40 - One-off costs for the course duration (compulsory trips, final portfolios or shows, etc)
- £800 - Optional study visits and placements for the course duration
If you need to bring equipment or materials with you, these will be outlined in your Welcome Letter.
The figures above don't include accommodation and living costs
Funding
For information about funding available, please visit our undergraduate funding page
Ask a student
What better way to find out about life at Falmouth University than by asking our current students?
From course details, our facilities and the local area to the social scene and settling in, our students are ready and available to answer any questions you might have. Simply set up your account, send them a question and they'll get back to you within 24 hours.
What our students do

The psychology of space: How interiors shape our behaviour
20 May 2022
Discover how interior environments can impact our daily lives and influence our behaviour.

Interior Design students create concept designs for AMATA
18 May 2022
Two second-year Interior Design BA(Hons) students have teamed up to create concept designs for an ex...

The difference between interior design and interior architecture
28 April 2022
Understand the key differences between interior design and interior architecture.

9 Best interior design Instagram accounts to follow
08 April 2022
Ashley shares nine of his favourite interior design Instagram accounts to take your feed to new heig...

Students create collaborative 'Future Trends' Report
22 December 2020
First and second year Interior Design students and first year Photography students have completed an...

Talented Falmouth Design Students Win National Competition
19 August 2020
Congratulations to Falmouth University students, Emily Robson and Romina Arellano-Templer, for their...

Frugi Feedback for Hollie
16 March 2020
First year Interior Design student Hollie Milne designed a trade stand for Frugi, the UKs leading or...

Interiors that are Lit
02 December 2019
Interior Design students have been playing with light and architecture to transform some of the nota...

Award Win for Design Student
23 September 2019
Interior Design student Fiona Poon has won the Public Space Design category in this year's Get me 2 ...

Student Gains Invaluable Design Experience
18 September 2019
Interior Design student Sam Viney recently undertook an internship with Resolution Interiors, an int...
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