Industrial, and Innovation Design Engineering

The Innovation Design Engineering (IDE) double masters programme, run jointly by the Royal College of Art and Imperial College London is now in its 34th year. Originally called Industrial Design Engineering, the aim of the programme was to provide an educational pathway for taking graduate engineers and produce a new type of industrial designer. The two-year full-time programme involves a series of themed but student-directed projects in the first year, prior to major group and solo projects in the second year. This chapter introduces the original purpose of the programme, documents some of the transitions as well as providing a description of the current format of the programme, with a particular focus on addressing the needs of industry and those of individual students and graduates, and the sometime tensions between these. The Innovation Design Engineering is characterised by a ‘borrowed discourse’ with no distinct disciplinary language owned by the community at the moment. This is manifest in the extensive engagement by the students in their collaborations across the Departments and Research Centres at Imperial and their willingness to explore diverse innovation spaces. Traditionally, graduates have gained subsequent employment in corporations and design consultancies. The last 5 years have seen a significant shift with the greater proportion of graduates setting up their own businesses and consultancies on completion of the programme.