UPHF - school of design
Located in the heart of France's leading industrial region, UPHF design school prepares designers for tomorrow's industry, which will be as innovative as it is understated, as powerful as it is responsible. Ethical designers equipped with the cultures, knowledge, methods and tools to design systems and objects for a sustainable and caring world.
For the industry
The 20th century was built on the promise of mechanical happiness, guaranteed by the constant growth of our knowledge, our innovations and our economies.
Lulled by these promises, renewed with each
industrial ‘revolution’, our territories allowed their industry and associated knowledge to drift away, on the grounds that value lay in services and digital technology.
In the 21st century, technological revolutions, the limits of the planet, global warming and geopolitical upheavals are forcing France and Europe to regain their industrial sovereignty.
This is essential for safeguarding jobs, social cohesion, protecting our environments and democratic values, of which Europe is a major proponent.
This reclaiming requires the development and mastery of technical and production knowledge, as well as multidisciplinary collaboration methods, in the service of responsible design for our living environments.
Design – multidisciplinary by definition – has a key role to play in this.
It is the school's mission to train these neo-industrial designers who are capable of bringing meaning and beauty to their designs.
With the industry
To fulfil this promise, the school has developed an ambitious multidisciplinary programme combining general culture, design, manufacturing and human sciences with a highly intensive project-based teaching approach, systematically linked to businesses of all sizes in the region.
In this teaching approach, the large number of contributors from the professional world ensure that the knowledge and practices taught are both up-to-date and relevant.
The business world itself is explained in all its diversity and complexity through an ambitious syllabus during the last two years of the programme.
This ongoing link with the world of industry, and more generally with the business world, is essential for the professional development of our students, who are supported by professional coaches throughout the five-year programme.
A strong industrial environment
A region at the crossroads of European influences, Hauts-de-France is now France's leading industrial region, while revealing an identity in the midst of change. For a design school, this territory represents a veritable laboratory: heir to a powerful industrial past — textiles, automobiles, railways, energy — the region is reinventing itself around innovation, the circular economy and new uses.
The diversity of its urban landscapes, rehabilitated brownfield sites and centres of excellence offers a unique testing ground for exploring ecological transition, the mobility of the future and the materiality of industry.
Hauts-de-France thus presents itself as a fertile ecosystem where design, technology and industry interact to imagine the forms of a more responsible future.
An ambitious programme
The school's programme is built around seven complementary pillars, combining general culture, artistic practices, manufacturing techniques, human sciences and business understanding. All this knowledge is put to use in an intensive project-based teaching approach, where our students test its necessity and effectiveness.
A school connected to the real world
Academic excellence and a strong focus on professional development. These are the two promises the school makes to you.
Academic excellence: as part of the Université Polytechnique Hauts-de-France, an innovative university that has placed multidisciplinarity at the heart of its mission, you will have access to all of this institution's resources, expertise and teaching staff.
High level of professionalism: we ensure this by constantly exposing you to the realities of the professional world, through your lecturers, who are all professionals, but also by offering you 15 projects over 5 years, always with a real company.
Internships and, above all, the last two years of work-study programmes reinforce this promise.