Interviews and Portfolios
Your Background
We look for evidence of good academic achievement and potential, coupled with a genuine enthusiasm for making places better! Our aim is to attract lively, determined and able students who can fully contribute to the studio environment and take advantage of academic and professional opportunities.
People come onto our courses from many different backgrounds. We are not dogmatic about previous subjects studied because we understand that people develop interests and skills in all parts of their lives. When teaching specific skills we aim to build on knowledge that students already have, whilst providing a good basic introduction for people who are less experienced. This could apply to observational drawing, proficiency in use of IT, plant knowledge or understanding of construction.
Your Interests
However, we hope to find most of the following skills and interests in our applicants.
- Engagement with places: an interest as to what makes places special.
- Creativity: an openness to experiment and make mistakes.
- Commitment to promoting a sustainable landscape which functions well socially and ecologically.
- A visual awareness and ambition: working to improve at sketching, modelling, photography and digital design.
- Ability to articulate ideas verbally and in writing.
- Ability to work on different tasks simultaneously and to balance priorities.
- Interest in people: responses and requirements in open spaces.
- Interest in the potential of plants to contribute to landscape quality.
- Enthusiasm about the use of digital technology in design and communication.
- General awareness of the scope and challenges of the profession of Landscape Architecture.
Preparing for the Course
If you are considering applying to one of our courses, think about how you can demonstrate these qualities. Any visits that you have been able to be make to a Landscape Architecture practice will also improve your awareness of the nature of the profession. Your local authority will employ Landscape Architects, or you can find a register of local private practices on the Landscape Institute Website.
Landscape Institute Website.
I want to be a landscape architect website.
The Portfolio
We generally ask undergraduate applicants to submit an electronic portfolio (instructions on how to do this will be sent individually) so we can assess your visual and creative skills and potential before we make an offer. It is helpful if this includes some observational sketches as well as any other visual work you may have done.
If you are taking an art or design based course please include work recently completed or work in progress. We understand that some of your work may be unavailable to you due to assessment procedures, so just include what you can. We welcome Design and Technology portfolios, though it would be appreciated if you could supplement the `design research and process´ work with freehand drawing from observation. This could be GCSE Art work, or you could tackle the exercise outlined below.
If you are not currently studying an art or design course please include examples of any creative work that you have completed recently or in the past. We especially appreciate examples of freehand observational sketching, so even if you have not had any formal training, get a pencil out and have a go! As a minimum, please try and include up to 10 drawings which explore the qualities of three places that are of interest to you, of which two should be public landscapes. We would also want you to dedicate one of your pieces to representing your street in a medium of your choice, accompanied by short piece of text (maximum 200 words) to complement it. Though they should include eye-level sketches, you may want to include observation of detail, communicating place at different seasons or times of day, annotations of how a place is used and your own reactions, use of different media if possible. If you feel you are inexperienced in drawing you may find the exercises in "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards useful.
The Open Day
If we make you an offer to study on one of our courses we will then invite you to an Open day where you will have allocated time to have an individual review with one of our members of academic staff. This will give you an opportunity to ask any questions that you may have and it will also give us an opportunity to give you further advice and useful guidance on how you might prepare further for starting the course.