FD Contemporary Crafts

The programme enables extensive exploration and investigation into glass, ceramics and metals in their many variations. We have splendidly equipped and accessible workshops. A team of excellent academic staff endeavours to help you develop your design and conceptual skills as well as the practical, technical skills that can be gained from experimenting and practicing in the workshops. A talented & dedicated team of technicians supports practical work.

The programme is designed to enable you to develop your own creative identity.

In the first year you will be introduced to materials and techniques, design and conceptual issues. You can explore a wide range of approaches. You will follow the path that suits you best whether it is as a specialist designer/maker in jewellery, ceramics, glass or metals or you could take a broader Applied Arts approach and develop skills to enable you to design and create objects in different materials.
The second year gives students an opportunity to develop their direction & skills, but with further opportunities & challenges such as designing and making for external design competitions and other live projects that come from outside the college. These could be for a large-scale sculpture, working with community or schools projects or designing and making awards.

If you are taking the part time route these experiences will of course be spread over a longer period.

The vocational nature of a Foundation Degree means that your creative skills are complemented by practical work experience and professional studies teaching supported by members of the academic team with experience of working in the Applied Arts Creative Industries. The South West region is a centre for craft based businesses, so there is a rich resource of opportunities to work with practitioners and galleries or related industries.

We also encourage cross-disciplinary ‘dialogue’ with other subjects throughout the college so that students have an enriched and broad experience.

You will have plenty of opportunities to develop related IT skills both within the course and the college as a whole.

You will also gain a thorough understanding of contemporary, historical, critical and contextual issues that surround the subject and influence where it is today. Our Making Futures Conference on Sustainability within the ‘crafts’ illustrates that the college is actively involved in current debates and that students are encouraged to work in a responsible, sustainable and ethical way.

Students are encouraged to become aware of and part of external organisations, to participate in and arrange external exhibitions so that by the time they complete the FD and later the BA, they are ready for working in the ‘outside world’. Many of our students and graduates are very proactive in this respect.

At the end of the Foundation Degree students can leave to pursue their chosen career path, but most of our students choose to progress onto our challenging and exciting BA year, to strengthen their skills and deepen their knowledge.

All the College's Higher Education provision is validated by the Open University. New programmes are required to go through an extensive approval process conducted by The Open University. The College is required to advertise any new programme as 'subject to validation' until this process has been completed.