Postgraduate Courses

Over three intensive terms, you will acquire a broad range of skills in both design and making, develop an impressive professional portfolio, and see your design work realised in a stage or screen context. Specialisation options include set design and construction, costume design and making, lighting or projection design, prop and puppetry design, design for screen, or event design, amongst many other options.

On this programme you will expand your own creative practice whilst gaining an understanding of the theories that underpin emerging practices in designing for theatrical performance.
You’ll use our specialist facilities to explore the performance experiences that can be created with light, space, objects, costume, sound, and digital technologies like pervasive media. You’ll have the freedom to experiment and create innovative performance through the medium of design. You’ll examine contemporary performance practices, including the immersive and participatory and those staged outside of the theatre, within their wider cultural and political contexts and you will deepen your capacity to analyse the impact and potential of performance design.
As you progress through your studies, you’ll apply what you’ve learned in an independent research project on a topic of your choice.
The staff are world leaders of research in the field and the latest research underpins the curriculum and the learning experience, equipping you to engage critically as well as creatively with the rapidly expanding field of scenography and performance design.
Leeds has a thriving cultural scene, and is home to contemporary performance events like Light Night, Compass Festival, and Transform Festival. Our industry connections allow you to work closely with local organisations such as Leeds Playhouse, Red Ladder Theatre and innovative artists in the field of performance design.
This course will give you the knowledge and skills to become an articulate and creative performance design practitioner. This could include; working as a designer or director in theatre, live performance, festivals or the events industry, creating your own performance events or performance company, or working in community arts. You’ll also gain a range of transferable skills in research, analysis, interpretation and communication, as well as imagination, independence and cultural awareness.

We are a world leader in the training of designers for performance producing Golden Globe, Tony & BAFTA-winning graduates. Our graduates are regularly honoured at the prestigious Linbury Prize for Stage Design We offer immersive, hands-on practical and ‘fit for the future’ training and have built strong relationships with major UK arts companies in film, TV, and theatre. Recent student & graduate film and TV credits include Willow, Havoc, His Dark Materials, Sex Education, Winter King among others. and get the chance to work with some of the country’s leading theatre, opera and dance companies and to exhibit at the National Theatre. We can offer placement opportunities with renowned venues like Royal Opera House, National Theatre, Sherman Theatre and Royal Shakespeare Company among others. Our in-house production company, the Richard Burton Company, produces around 24 productions a year which offer our students cross-course collaborative opportunities Our design students create their design work for public performances, working with directors, actors, musicians’ singers and stage managers. The performances range from classic dramas, specially commissioned plays, main stage musicals, large-scale operas and, uniquely for design, site-specific puppetry. We offer regular talks and visits by leading international practitioners like RWCMD Fellows Pamela Howard and Paule Constable. We have a high ratio of staff to students with lots of dedicated one-to-one training and mentoring available to our students.

MA Design for Performance pathways in: Set & Costume Design; Costume Design & Construction: Set Design; Scenic Arts & Construction; Prop Design & Build; Lighting Design: Sound Design; Digital & Media Design.