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Design Department

The Design Department at Cornish provides a small, personal studio environment, with a focus on demanding conceptual projects that support exploration and creative risk-taking. The curriculum is based on visual, technical, and conceptual investigations. These will lead to new approaches to communicate information, envision environments, and new forms for storytelling. Students will also learn to promote ideas and messages, explore graphics in motion, and discover new interactive experiences and visual forms for entertainment.

The department integrates professional engagement with community involvement into the curriculum. The faculty is composed of active working professionals in the Seattle community and the Department Advisory Committee provides ongoing advice about the programs. The wider professional community is involved through studio projects based on actual client projects in the students' junior and senior years. These activities include inviting guest designers to class critiques; lunchtime and evening guest speakers; field trips; extra-curricular group projects; internships; student exhibitions; student interest groups; and active links with professional associations such as the AIGA, IIDA, and ASID. The classroom studios mimic the professional environment. Every student works at a drafting table with a personal laptop connected to a range of digital peripherals. Senior students have a personal studio space for their final year.