the context

Thomas More University College

is the university college for those who expect more from their future: more opportunities, more ideas, more challenges. Every day, Thomas More inspires over 17.000 students on 12 locations in the heart of Europe. The University College is part of the University of Leuven Association.

interieur&design

The department offers the following courses: bachelor in interior design (180 credits) and a post graduate in furniture design (VOMO) (60 credits).

The bachelor in interior design offers an international semester to exchange students in English. During and after their interior design studies, students can specialize in furniture design.

The postgraduate in furniture design combines its strong regional roots with an international orientation.

GIDE

The Group for International Design Education is an international consortium of higher education art and design institutions who collaborate annually in order to enrich the creative and cultural experiences of students, staff and participating institutions.

Initially developed at Leeds College of Art and Thomas More University College Mechelen, it consists today of seven core partner institutions from Scotland, Slovenia, England, Belgium, Germany, Italy and Switzerland and recently worked closely with guests schools from USA and China.

Website : www.gidegroup.wordpress.com

campus Lucas Faydherbe

The centre of the interior&design courses of Thomas More is campus Lucas Faydherbe, situated in the vicinity of the historical and commercial centre of Mechelen. This inspiring open campus, located in converted old vegetable market halls, is a project of contemporary design.

Mechelen city

During the 15th and 16th century,Mechelen earned the status of legal capital of the Burgundian empire. Since those hey-days, the city has built a rich history of various crafts, amongst which wood carving and furniture craftsmanship.

With the industrial revolution and the first railway on the European continent, Mechelen expanded into a manufacturing town. Especially the furniture industry bloomed well into the second half of the 20th century.

the VOMO course

With furniture design as a speciality, Interior & Design at Thomas More Mechelen has the ambition to add a chapter to the rich furniture tradition of Mechelen.

Still, the furniture design course does not lose itself in nostalgia.

It dynamically creates its own individual character and authenticity.

The symbiosis of a product oriented developing and spatial approach (product development versus architecture) is the ideal environment to train furniture designers.

With an open minded focus on the architecture of furniture,

inspired by industry as well as arts & crafts,

combining conceptual approaches with down-to-earth attitudes,

networking between professional designers and organisations,

the furniture prototypes, produced in the recent 15 years,

present the four aspects of our postgraduate in furniture design:

our aim to innovate,

with an eye for both crafts and technology,

realized within our extensive furniture network

and tested in an international context.

The Post Graduate in Furniture Design (VOMO) is a one-year full-time course, which annually accepts 20 candidates, selected by means of a screening/examination. The intake comes from various initial trainings, such as architecture, product development, interior design, e.a.

Recent projects were realized in cooperation with companies like Fritz Hansen, Bulo, Ikea and Vitra.

the student

“Create your own design project in a MAKER culture, with coaching of a multidisciplinary team.”

Concept and technique, communication and economy

The student learns to find a balance between the conceptual, the technical, the communicative, and the economical aspect of designing. Workshops, lectures, visits to companies and fairs, make it a practically-oriented, fascinating, interactive, and all-round learning proces.

Process- and task-oriented

In the design studio the student invents innovative concepts proceeding from traditional or industrial (im)perfection, artistically and technologically influenced.

To support this creative work, the student experiments with materials, shapes and constructions to create dummies and prototypes in the practice studio.

Focus on project and student

The student is stimulated in his self-development, but also coached in dealing with limitations in a “free” design assignment. An interprofessional team, complemented by experts from the furniture sector, coaches each student in his personal creation and development of a curriculum. Furthermore, the student gets the opportunity to execute assignments in a team.

alumni

By winning a number of (inter)national individual and inter-scholar contests with furniture prototypes and objects, and by designing and realizing a number of interior projects, our students and alumni already gained an outstanding reputation.

Many former students are now furniture designers and/or manufacturers, creating an own artistic oeuvre, making custom-made furniture for individual private and public clients, or developing and producing industrial furniture.

more information

website : www.VOMO.be

facebookpage : www.facebook.com/vomo.be

email : info@vomo.be

Exhibitions in 2015 :

1. -in Design museum Gent :  Van vlinder en mieren, cooperation project with Fritz Hansen and Bulo.
   

2. -in C-Mine Genk :  Project VITRA, cooperation project with Vitra.
   

Graduation exhibition :

Saterday, June 25th and Sunday, June 26th, 2016, from 10 am to 4 pm