BA & MA programme admission information
Interior Architecture bachelor and master programme is taught in Estonian, admission information can be found
here. The minimum level of Estonian language skills must be B2.
Exchange studies at EKA
Each semester EKA has the pleasure to welcome around 50-60 new incoming exchange students from our partner universities. With the help of fellow students and staff members, they all settle into the life of EKA quickly and enjoy their experience with us a lot. Whenever we have exchange students in our courses, we switch most of our studio classes to English or at least do the classes bilingually.
Our department accepts exchange students at both bachelor’s and master’s levels. Although our specialty is called interior architecture, we are an interdisciplinary department, operating at the intersection of spatial design, interior architecture, architecture, exhibition design, product design, and the fine arts. Therefore, we are happy to invite students from other disciplines to study with us.
What we offer
For BA-level students, we usually offer participation in various design studios with first, second and third year students, so that the international student has the opportunity to get acquainted with the diverse projects of our department. The main project of the first year is the design of a small building. At the same time, students also participate in a studio where a wooden chair is designed and built.
In the second year program, we offer international students the opportunity to participate in design studios, the first of which focuses on living space and the second on educational space. Although both courses end with real design projects, in terms of teaching methodology, we value philosophising about the functioning of society and basic values in a broader sense in these subjects. The Educational Space Studio often takes place in collaboration with self-established organisations whose area of interest is the renewal of the educational landscape (e.g. VARES residency in Valga or Textile Center residency in Lehtse).
In the third year main program, we offer international students two larger design studios: Public Space and Object. In the first, students work on designing and rethinking buildings with a public function, while in the second, students design and prototype some interior architectural elements.
Master’s level students can participate in four design studios and two specialised theory courses in both the fall and spring semesters. At the heart of both semesters is one larger design studio, within which we focus on materials, adaptive re-use, spatial design and the theoretical interpretation of our activities. In the ‘Spatial Art’ course, we look at interior architecture from the perspective of a scenographer and envision different spatial narratives. The ‘Inclusive Space for All’ studio is usually held in collaboration with a partner organization (e.g. Eesti Pank, North Estonia Regional Hospital, State Real Estate Company, etc.), with whom we seek a real solution to a current problem. The Master’s program also includes two courses focused on furniture making: in the ‘Site-Specific Construction’ studio, students intervene in existing architecture with their temporary installations, and in the ‘Sit/Go’ studio, students search for initial impulses for spatial creation in the furniture scale from each student’s family history and home landscape.
In addition to the design studios, international students can participate in the software study classes offered by our department. Some Architecture and Urban Planning studios are also open to both BA and MA students, and are introduced to interested parties at the beginning of each semester.
EKA is a fairly small and intimate university (approx. 1200 students), which means that cooperation between different departments is active and friendly – this means that exchange students from our department are also welcome to courses in other departments and all workshops in the building are open to them: wood and model-making workshop, metal workshop, blacksmithing worshop, prototyping laboratory, new media studios, digital printing workshop, analogue photography laboratory, graphics workshop, glass workshops and many other possibilities. See more here: https://www.artun.ee/en/studies/workshops/
In addition to the regular subjects of the curriculum, EKA offers 30-50 optional subjects each semester, which vary from origami to contact improvisation and from sound art to choral singing. Check out the latest opportunities here: https://www.artun.ee/en/studies/optional-subjects/
In addition, EKA has agreements with other Estonian universities, which means that our (exchange) students can also participate in courses at other higher education institutions in Tallinn and beyond – for example, the Baltic Film and Media School is located nearby, where regular screening sessions on the history of film, etc. take place.
Application procedures
First you should contact your home university’s coordinator who will have to send a nomination e-mail to
incoming@artun.ee.
Once EKA International Office has received your nomination and confirmed it, you are welcome to submit your online application form together with required documents (see down below) to EKA by the deadline.
Deadlines for applications and nominations:
- May 1 (for autumn semester and the whole academic year)
- October 15 (for spring semester)
After the deadline, all applications will be sent to corresponding departments, where the heads of curriculums make the decision based on students’ application.
The International Office will notify the applicants about acceptance/denial within a month.
Further information can be found
here.
