Product Design (with an industrial placement year) BA (Hons)

Program Overview

The University of Sussex's Product Design program offers students the chance to learn about and practice creating products that meet the evolving needs of society. Graduates can pursue careers in manufacturing, design consulting, and the creative industries.

Program Outline

During your studies, you’ll:

• Be taught by design experts with industry experience
• Combine design, art, environment, science, business and technology skills, reflecting the multifaceted subject of product design
• Work with industry professionals on live creative briefs that will challenge you and develop your understanding of how design fits in different sectors
• Have the opportunity to apply for a placement where you can gain experience working in industry.
We’ll ground you in critical design thinking and research. This helps you develop informed solutions and produce them through responsible prototyping and manufacturing models. You’ll also design your products to fit within the circular economy – a complex systems-based model of working that is regenerative to the planet and takes sustainability to a new level. Your degree prepares you for success. In recent years, our students have:
• Won international awards from design leaders such as Dyson, LEGO and Hasbro
• Taken their own designs to market through the Sussex Innovation Centre
• A wide range of career options – from stepping into design jobs after graduation, to setting up their own design studios.
This can be a fantastic opportunity to gain real-life insight into industry as well as skills valued by employers.
• Find an employer
• Draft an application
• Prepare for interviews.
We understand that deciding where and what to study is a very important decision. We’ll make all reasonable efforts to provide you with the courses, services and facilities described in this prospectus. However, if we need to make material changes, for example due to government or regulatory requirements, or unanticipated staff changes, we’ll let you know as soon as possible.

Outline:

Year 1

• Autumn teaching
• Creative Research Methods for Design
• Drawing for Design
• Materials and Processes for Product Design
• Mathematics for Product Design
• Spring teaching
• Applied Technology for Product Design
• Computer Aided Visualisation
• Experience Prototyping
• The Narrative of Design in Modern Culture
• Intersemester Week
• Global Design Challenge

Year 2

• Autumn teaching
• Design Techniques in Practice
• Human Factors and Ergonomics
• Interaction Methods
• Autumn and spring teaching
• Industry Ready: Mastering the Placement Application Process
• Spring teaching
• Design for Industry
• Integrated Product Design: Research, Theory and Practice
• Professional and Managerial Skills
It’s a proven way to fast-track your career.
• Recent students have gone on placements at:
• Rolls-Royce
• IBM
• Black+Decker.
• You develop your technical, team-working and transferable skills, and apply what you have learnt in your studies to a business environment.
• Finding an employer
• Drafting an application
• Preparing for interviews
• Ongoing help throughout a placement.

Year 3

• Autumn teaching
• Business and Project Management
• Design Philosophy
• The Role of Design in the Circular Economy
• Autumn and spring teaching
• Design Project (BA)
• Spring teaching
• Thinking Big: The 5 Senses

Teaching:

• You'll be taught by design experts with industry experience.
• We'll ground you in critical design thinking and research.

Careers:

During your studies, you’ll have the opportunity to work on live industry briefs. You’ll gain valuable experience working with leading experts from a broad range of companies. Recent collaborations include:

• IBM
• Aardman Animations
• Big Potato Games
• Stanley Black and Decker
• Dyson
• Bird and Blend Tea
• Paladone
• Lush Cosmetics
• Brighton Museum.
In recent years, a team of product designers won the Inventors Workshop New Designers Award, creating the brand-new toy concept Bandit at the Toy and Game Fair in London. The students worked together as a team on an industrial live brief, using the skills they gained at Sussex. You’ll develop creative, problem-solving and project-management skills throughout your course. There are tailored careers events opportunities including drop-in sessions, industry talks and one-to-one support. Your Product Design degree prepares you for jobs in manufacturing, consultancy-based design and the wider creative industries (graphics, marketing, research and digital design). Product Designers can work in a variety of roles including:
• Industrial, packaging, toy or furniture designer
• Design engineer or product developer
• Design researchers, strategists and consultants
• UX (user experience) designer and 3D visualiser
• UI (user interface) designer
• Specialist designers within sectors such as aviation/automotive
We’re planning to run these modules in the academic year 2024/25. The structure of a small number of courses means that the order of modules or the streams you choose may determine whether modules are core or optional. This means that your core modules or options may differ from what’s shown here.
• Check back in January 2025 for more details of the modules running in the academic year 2025/26.
• Core modules are taken by all students on the course.
They give you a solid grounding in your chosen subject and prepare you to explore the topics that interest you most.
• We understand that deciding where and what to study is a very important decision.
We’ll make all reasonable efforts to provide you with the courses, services and facilities described in this prospectus. However, if we need to make material changes, for example due to government or regulatory requirements, or unanticipated staff changes, we’ll let you know as soon as possible.
• BSc or BA?
• Sussex helped me re-think how we consume and use products, and what we waste.” Lucy Hughes Product Design BSc graduate Winner of the International Dyson Award 2019 Read Lucy’s story
• Product Design student Jake Thompson’s cycling app, Flare, attracts global interest
Find out more about career development and part-time work
• Silver
• The student experience and student outcomes are typically very high quality.
• This rating was awarded in 2023, for four years.
• (Teaching Excellence Framework 2023)
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