Curious about studying Costume Design and Making - BA (Hons)at Bucks New University? We've gathered all the key details—entry requirements, modules, fees, and more. Hear from real students by checking out reviews, or take the next step by booking an open day to explore it for yourself.
Bachelor of Arts (with Honours) - BA (Hons)
Pinewood Studios
Full Time
Oct 2026
3 Year
Led by a dedicated and experienced course team, you’ll benefit from their industry knowledge and the industry links they bring to the course. You’ll get direct access to guest lectures, who are specialists in the sector, and can benefit from live project briefs, master classes, and networking opportunities. We also have links with the National Theatre and the British Fashion Council.
Inspiring facilitiesWe’ve spent a lot of love and care making the Fashion and Textile Studios the perfect creative space and one of the best-equipped workshops in the country. You'll be working on industry standard equipment, learning latest techniques and future focused methods of costume craftsmanship.You will master materials, both through traditional methods and using digital software. This includes an in-house fabric and yarn store, screen printing facilities, a dye laboratory and sewing and garment production facilities. We also have specialist technicians and demonstrators on site to support and share their knowledge with you, when and if you need it.
NetworkingAs part of the Art, Design and Performance School at BNU, you’ll benefit from a practiced-based course, supported by contextual studies. You’ll also have the opportunity to work collaboratively across the school with other courses, ensuring during your studies you are building a varied network, like you would in the real world.
Career-focusedDuring your time on the course you’ll lend your hand to a range of styles, techniques and periods. Your modules and briefs allow you to develop the skills that employers are looking for, whilst ensuring you have a varied and desirable portfolio.
What will I study?This course is also offered as a four-year programme, including an initial Foundation Year. The Foundation Year will allow you to develop your academic study skills and build confidence in your abilities, identifying your own strengths and development needs for progression onto an undergraduate programme.With this costume design course you can expect a whirlwind of briefs, from period dresses to futuristic and modern-day costumes - immerse yourself in the scripts, and bring performances to life with your creations.Creativity, innovation, critical, independent thinking, and the development of your personal design philosophy are at the core of this Costume Design and Making degree. The course aims to develop your knowledge and skills in costume design on both an artistic and professional level. You’ll apply your knowledge and understanding to the range of professional environments where your practice can be developed, from film and television productions to theatre and media performances.On this university-level costume design course you’ll start with the core fundamentals, including contextual studies, 2D and 3D, pattern cutting, manufacturing, illustration and applying your knowledge to character representation through script and story interpretation. As you progress through the course, you’ll begin to investigate the fashion, theatre, and film industry, through a series of design and live industry projects, advanced pattern cutting, manufacturing, processes and materials workshops. This course is also offered as a four-year programme, including an initial Foundation Year. The Foundation Year will allow you to develop your academic study skills and build confidence in your abilities, identifying your own strengths and development needs for progression onto an undergraduate programme.
This module will continue to extend your application of visual research methodologies, alongside a series of practical workshops with the aim of enabling them to produce innovative and original ideas, which will form the basis of their design project. Through analysis and reflection of their experiences in each of the workshops you’ll extend your cultural awareness of their design.
This module will introduce you to a range of pattern cutting and construction techniques that will enable you to learn the technical skills required to realise garments for the fashion and costume sectors.
This module will extend your awareness and ability to consider fabric weight, drape and composition when designing and making a garment. Whether it is from a historic or future design perspective these key attributes will inform individual experimentation, choice of construction and pattern cutting.
This module will allow you to study a range of traditional and contemporary processes in textile design, enabling you to create innovative textiles for characters within a costume narrative. Independent experimentation will consider the historic or social influences on the themes of the print, texture of fabrics. Widening awareness and knowledge of ethical and sustainable materials will be integrated into the module content.
In this module, you’ll be introduced to a range of theories, contexts and cultural themes associated with fashion, clothing textiles and costume design over the course of a series of lectures and seminars. You’ll develop your theoretical approaches towards the history of fashion and costume design and contemporary costume design for film.
On this module you’ll be presented with key global debates which impact our lives and could influence your creative practice and positions as creatives in ever-changing professional industries. Through research and critical reflection, you’ll explore these issues which may be related to sustainability, politics and other ecological or socio- economic factors, and respond to them creatively using your chosen discipline-specific practice.
In this module, you’ll be given the opportunity to respond to the professional challenges facing costume designers. The project will extend understanding of script analysis and visual characterisation which informs garment design, construction and materials chosen.
The Independent Project module provides you with an opportunity to develop a creativity that establishes your own practice within a theoretical framework. It will expand your knowledge of a range of concepts, values and debates that inform and influence your creative practice, developing innovative approaches to their research and development of design and construction proposals.
Through research and interpretation of historical period sources, costume making knowledge will be extended by introducing advanced pattern cutting and costume making techniques to explore individual costume outcomes.
This module aims to support your employability by evaluating your costume design practice within a professional context to develop an understanding of the key skills and attributes required to support your career.
The Research Strategies module is designed to help you prepare and plan for your practice-based report in Year 3. Through a series of thematic lectures and seminars, the module provides a framework for you to understand and explore cultural knowledge, concepts in fashion, textiles, costume design, the broader field of art and design and popular culture, as developed from the theory module in Year 1.
The aim of this module is for you to complete a proposal for your final major project, evidencing how it will be developed in response to substantial research on the sector and reflection on your previous practical outcomes.
This module develops your research practice from the contextual foundation established in previous modules. You are provided with an opportunity to sustain the creative dialogue between their research and subject-based practice, enabling you to establish your professional and creative identity through a self-directed brief/proposal.
This module will enhance your understanding and appreciation of the roles, relationships, and responsibilities that can play a major part in progressing and sustaining your professional practice. You’ll be encouraged to undertake commissions and other work-related learning opportunities such as engaging with industry briefs.
In this you’ll develop in-depth knowledge of your chosen field of practice, which will support the critical appraisal process and inform the social and professional context for your work. You’ll also begin to develop self-promotional material and your understanding of key aspects relevant to business.
Through workshops, seminars, and one-to-one supervision tutorials, this module provides learners with the support required for writing their contextual report on practice. This self-directed theoretical/critical and evaluative piece of written work consists of a detailed account of the critical references surrounding your final major project.
4.4Bucks New University (BNU) is a student-focused university based in High Wycombe, with over 130 years of educational his...
