Department of Design Faculty of Arts

What Is Design?

The world of design includes everything from two-dimensional space to three-dimensional and time space, and design is spreading throughout commercial and artistic fields by leaps and bounds. Design operates in both the material and spiritual realms and is applied to every kind of tangible and intangible thing. Indeed, society could not exist today without design. Designers examine the elements that should be incorporated in design--such as information, convenience, and entertainment value--from various angles. They then transform them into even more outstanding value and present their designs to society through various media. By giving people joy and a sense of fulfillment and making their lives comfortable and meaningful, design creates society and culture. Design has this kind of outstanding power.

Do You Like to Use Your Hands?

The Department of Design seeks people who thrive on creating paintings and other forms of art and things, people who love to come up with ideas and to exercise their imagination and then to express what is in their mind as tangible and intangible things. We seek people who have a passion for being involved with the world and want to devote themselves to contributing to it using these skills.

Learning about the Changes in Design Expression and the Unchanging Principles of Design

These days design tools are transitioning from analog to digital, and the range of tools undergoing this shift is growing. New types of media also continue to be created, and the thought processes used in these tools and systems are being questioned. To create a single tangible thing, designs of various genres are applied in a composite fashion. In other words, design is not a single perspective; rather, it requires a multi-angled perspective. At the Department of Design, we take a comprehensive approach to design. Students study designs of various genres in their first and second years, thereby creating a base for the specialization they will develop starting from their third year. Students are expected to use computers, but what is required before that is an analog awareness: the ability to think with their hands about tangible things. This is vital. Students are taught to see this analog awareness as the core and they gain design skills that are applicable in the real world. To cover the world of design in all its breadth and depth, we have created four fields, Graphic Design, Illustration, Visual Information Design, and Space Product Design. Starting in their third year, students develop a full specialization so that they can be valuable players in the real world.