The module establishes a critical review of the relationship between ideas and the production of architecture and design. Through understanding the relationship of specific buildings and interiors and the reading and analysis of key texts and it establishes an idea of 'modern'. It establishes the way this has historically, and contemporarily been interpreted in theoretical and material projects about the city, architecture and design.

The programme of study is in two parts:

Lecture Course
This is a series of illustrated lectures on the formal and ideological issues evident in the work of influential modern architects and interior designers. The course is broadly chronological and traces the development of the 'modern' through different ideologies and critiques. The emphasis of the course is on built work and developments in the output of specific designers. This allows for the identification of specific 'spatial strategies' (rather than stylistic 'movements') and the detailed analysis of ideas in practice. The broader context of the ideas forms the larger framework and includes issues such as mass production, materials and technology, home and work, social and public space, art and aesthetics, media and publishing, competitions and exhibitions, theories of city.

Seminar Course
The seminar series is based on student presentations and discussion of a number of key texts involving the modern city and questions of citizenship. This course encourages the student to think beyond the individual building as a discrete object, and instead reflect on the wider context of the city. The course introduces the student to a range of 'non-architectural' texts on the city that are nevertheless relevant to the debate on its design. These may include texts by geographers, philosophers, writers, historians, economists as well as architectural urban theorists. The course encourages students to interpret their own experience of cities and discuss how different writers convey, express and argue for their ideas.