Major Description
Sustainable design calls on a student’s creativity to conceptualize, visualize, analyze, communicate, and build products, buildings, cities, landscapes, and communities that use energy and materials in a more environmentally and socially sustainable manner. Sustainable design majors complete course work in graphic and industrial design, architecture, landscape architecture, and urban and regional planning. The program combines concrete skills development with opportunities to move between disciplinary barriers and traverse traditional boundaries.
Courses That Introduce the Major
- FAA 230–Sustainable Design of the Built Environment
- ARCH 171–Introduction to Design I
- LA 101–Introduction to Landscape Arch
- UP 136–Urban Sustainability
- ARTD 225 or ARTF 102–Design Drawing or Observational Drawing
Students should consult with an academic advisor regarding course selection prior to the advanced registration period.
Possible Career Opportunities
Students who graduate from the program are versatile designers equipped work in multidisciplinary teams in a broad range of possible careers and/or graduate programs.
Common Career Skills
- Creativity
- Understanding the interconnectivity between natural and built environments and systems
- Working in multidisciplinary teams to solve complex design problems
- Combining design theory and practice with sustainability principles to address environmental issues at various scales
- Visual and material communication — including sketching, drafting, model-making, 2D and 3D design software and geographic information systems
- Interpreting environmental and energy policy to design effective solutions
- Ability to take a complex problem and deconstruct it to actionable components
- Curiosity
Common Career Titles
- Environmental Management
- Landscape Designer
- Sustainability Policy
- Urban Designer
- Project Manager
- Architectural Drafter/Designer
- Sustainability Designer
- Sustainability Program Coordinator
- Sustainability Specialist
- Design Engineer
- Environmental Educator
- Food-Systems Coordinator
- Environmental Marketing Specialist
- Design Researcher
- Energy Designer
- Green/Climate Designer
Some careers may require education beyond an undergraduate degree.
Enhancing Your Academic Experience
- Partake in opportunities and events for Sustainable Designers
- Participating in undergraduate research
- Applying for a study abroad experience
- DIS Copenhagen in Copenhagen, Denmark (summer or semester abroad): Study coursework in sustainable development, environmental impact and policy, Danish design, and innovation through design thinking!
- University of Sheffield in Sheffield, England (semester abroad): Study coursework in landscape architecture and urban studies and planning!
- National University of Singapore in Singapore (semester abroad): Study course work in design and the environment!
- Uppsala University in Uppsala, Sweden (semester abroad): Study coursework in sustainable design, ecopsychology, climate change leadership, global sustainability, and sustainable development in Sweden!
- Utilizing resources of FAA Career Services
- Joining a Registered Student Organization (RSO) related to this major, such as:
- Epsilon Eta Epsilon (TrEEE) serves as a group to foster community among sustainable design, architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, and any other majors pertaining to environmental studies and/or design.
- Design For America at UIUC is a design organization that advocates for interdisciplinary applications and awareness of human-centered design. Its core mission involves the development and implementation of projects with various partners utilizing the human-centered design process and the teaching of human-centered design principles to members of the club and greater community.
- Alpha Rho Chi
- Hispanic Organization of Urban Studies and the Environment (HOUSE)
- Illinois Solar Decathlon
- Student Sustainability Committee
- Design Innovation Illinois
- Students for Environmental Concerns
- Business In Environmental Responsibility
- ActGreen
- Growth International Volunteer Excursions
- Brands Give Back
- Design for America at UIUC
- Enactus
- Makers at UIUC
- Student Planning Organization
- The Recyclops Club
- Environmental Coalition
- From the Ground Up
- Project 4 Less
- Red Bison Ecological Restoration
- Red Oak Rain Garden
- Root to Roof
- vermiCUlture
Further Information
There are several professional organizations dedicated to sustainable design. Their websites might be able to provide a glimpse of what sustainable designers do. These organizations include International Society of Sustainability Professionals, United States Green Building Council Students, American Planning Association, U.S. Green Building Council , American Sustainable Business Council, Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute, Environmental Design Research Association, International Society for Industrial Ecology, and Biomimicry Institute.