Fashion Design BA (Hons)

BA (Hons) Fashion Design at the Glasgow School of Art nurtures a dynamic, inclusive, and supportive learning environment that centres on preparing students for the future, whether they want to pursue careers in industry, with community groups, set up their own practices and businesses, or continue their educational journeys. <br/><br/>The programme seeks to create assured and specialist fashion design graduates that demonstrate creative freedom and diversity in terms of target audiences, ideas, processes and practices towards their individual interests and aspirations. The programme offers the opportunity to examine the field of fashion design in depth. Fashion is concerned with the shape, cut, silhouette and construction of clothing. Students honour and learn from fashion traditions whilst looking to the future, learning to balance originality of concept with design viability. The emphasis is on future heritage, not celebrity-driven, quick, and cheaply manufactured clothing, which often damages the term ‘fashion’. The curriculum develops students’ creative identity through skills development and experimentation with research, drawing, design, technical investigation, form and material exploration, and visualisation. Studio and workshop learning promotes innovation through making, including heritage and contemporary techniques, digital skills and design processes. Sustainable, responsible and global perspectives of design continue to evolve to inform practices and outcomes. <br/><br/>Students gain a working knowledge of core industry skills: research methods, analysis, translation, drawing and colour, pattern cutting, and construction, whilst reflecting on their beliefs and career aspirations through design briefs that will contextualise their practice. Latterly, students elect to specialise in an area of fashion depending on their individual skills and interests. <br/><br/>Within the programme, Studio courses provide a series of incremental project-based experiences with opportunities to reflect upon learning as it develops towards building a critical practice. Design History and Theory courses explore critical and contextual perspectives, and courses shared with other programmes, including Co-Lab and Design Domain, foster expanded perspectives by connecting broader domains of learning and knowledge. Opportunities for student international exchanges, collaborative learning, external partnership projects, competitions, and careers and enterprise experiences help support how students develop graduate skills and attributes.

Explore your creativity at Glasgow School of Art, ranked #12 in the world for Art and Design (2025 QS World University Rankings by Subject). <br/><br/>The GSA offers an immersive creative education, with studio-based programmes across four specialist schools: Fine Art, Design, Architecture, and Innovation & Technology. Combining 150 years of research with modern thinking, each course provides 21st century teaching, designed to give your the skills needed for competitive creative industries. <br/><br/>Specialist on-site facilities include: architecture workshops, a media studio, photography labs, printmaking spaces, silversmithing and jewellery workshops and more. You’ll explore new technologies, experiment across media, and showcase your work in on-campus exhibitions.<br/><br/>The GSA has produced eight Turner Prize nominees and world-renowned alumni, including architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh, painter Jenny Saville, fashion designer Pam Hogg, and actors Robbie Coltrane and Peter Capaldi.