Admission Requirements MA in Architecture

Admission requirements
To be eligible to apply, applicants must have a Bachelor's degree in architecture or architectural studies from a nationally recognised school of architecture. This means that your degree must be recognised by a national architectural association or board as a degree that leads to a professional qualification as an architect.

Selection Criteria
Admission is based primarily on an assessment of Portfolio and relevant professional experience. As part of the overall assessment applicants may be called for an interview.

Below you will find further information depending on the origin of your qualifying degree.

Degree from EU institution
Bachelor degree in architecture granting admission to an m.arch. (or similar) that is recognized within the EU allowing you to practice as an architect. 

See EU Directive 2005/36/EC on the recognition of professional qualifications, annex 5.7.1., for the comprehensive list of approved degrees.

Degree from institution outside EU
Bachelor degree in architecture from recognised university or school of architecture.

Bachelor degree in architecture must be recognised and accredited by national architecture accreditation authorities as giving access to practicing as an architect, either directly or via Master degree in architecture.

In addition the following criteria apply

• Applicants whose degree is in a major-minor system, must have their major in architecture. Applicants with a minor in architecture or architectural studies are not eligible
• Applicants with degrees in all other subjects, including design, interior architecture, landscape architecture, urban & rural planning, construction, and engineering, are not eligible for admission
• Regarding eligibility with a degree from a Danish institution; only applicants with a bachelor degree in architecture from the Royal Danish Academy or Aarhus School of Architecture are eligible for admission

Online Application

The online application system will open 15 January. The deadline is 1 March at 11:59 p.m.

We accept the following formats: pdf, doc, docx, jpg, jpeg, mov, mpeg and png.

By submitting an application you confirm the validity and originality of the documents. Should you fail to comply with these regulations your application and any admission offer will be cancelled.

Portfolio
Technical Requirements – Your portfolio must

• be in a single document
• not exceed 10 MB
• be optimized for viewing on a standard size computer screen

• be uploaded at the time the application is submitted 

  You may include a link to external online materials in the end of your portfolio, but submitting only a link without a portfolio is not accepted. 
   

Content requirements – Your digital portfolio should

• include your own most important and representative design and/or architecture work
• for group work, your contributions to the project should be clearly identified and described
• contain relevant work from your BA study and working experience if applicable
• be oriented towards the programme for which you are applying
• include a short text for each project
  
   
• We would like to remind you that plagiarism or misrepresenting the work of others as your own is an offense against intellectual property rights and is a serious breach of academic misconduct. The work you are presenting in your portfolio must be of your own creation
   

Additional information regarding portfolio:

• you may include hand drawings and sketches, and not only computer drawings
• we suggest that you include process work that shows the development of the chosen idea
• we do not have specific requirements regarding the number of projects or pages
• we do not give further advise or guidance on portfolios
   

Transcripts
We accept transcripts of exam records or diploma supplement in English, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, German, French, Italian, and Spanish.

Documents in all other languages must be translated into English or Danish either by a certified translator or your school/university.

For application purposes we accept a digital copy or scan of transcripts.

Bachelor degree certificate
We welcome applications from students that have already completed or is about to complete their Bachelor's degree. If you haven't completed your Bachelor's degree by the time of applying we require to receive the degree certificate by 1 August.

CV
List your educational qualifications and relevent work experience

Language proficiency
Refer to section 'Language Requirements' for information on which documents and tests are accepted.

Copy of passport (photo page)
In your application you are required to submit a scan of your passport photo page. If you do not have a passport then you may upload a scan of your national ID card photo page. 

If you have multiple citizenships then you must upload a scan of your passport photo pages for all of your citizenships.

Credit transfer
Pursuant Danish higher education legislation, applicants are required to submit documentation for any credits on previous Master's level programmes/courses. We are obligated to evaluate whether previous obtained credits are credit transferable into your Master's. For more information please refer to https://royaldanishacademy.com/credit-transfer-ma-programmes

Documents that should not be included
Motivational letters and reference letters are not taken into consideration during general assessment for admission and we therefore ask our applicants not to include these.

Choose the correct programme

Three MA programmes are offered as both architecture and design degrees:

- Furniture Design: Products, Materials and Contexts
- Spatial Design
- Strategic Design & Entrepreneurship

Make sure that you choose the correct programme title in the application form. For instance “MA in Architecture – Spatial Design” or “MA in Design – Spatial Design”.

Applicants for architecture must hold a Bachelor's degree in architecture or architectural studies. Architecture students must pay particular attention to applying for the degree in architecture in order to graduate as cand. arch/Master of Arts in Architecture and thus being able to practise as an architect. Applicants who apply for architecture without having a Bachelor's degree in architecture will receive a rejection .
 
To be eligible for a design degree you must hold a bachelor's degree in design or a similar, design-related degree. 
 

You can apply for one programme

You are allowed to apply for only one architecture and one design programme.

If you apply for more than one programme in architecture and/or design then we will assess the first application that you have sent us in architecture and/or design. We will cancel the subsequent applications. 

It is not possible for applicants to change programme after the application deadline.
 

No exception to language requirements 

We do not make any exceptions to our language requirements or deadline.

If you do not meet the language requirement by 1 May any admission offer you may have received will be withdrawn and offered to the next qualified applicant.

If you already have a Master's degree

If you have already completed one Master’s degree equivalent of a Danish 2-year Master's (EQF 7) then your chance of being admitted is minimal due to the Danish rule of limitation of multiple degrees. 
 

If you have multiple citizenships

If you have multiple citizenships then you must upload a scan of your passport photo pages for all of your citizenships in your application. 

The Royal Danish Academy has a quota on number of places for EU citizens and non EU citizens. We are by law not allowed to offer an EU place to a non EU applicant and vice versa.

If we have given you an offer of admission based on the citizenship in your application and later discover that you have a dual citizenship then we have to withdraw your offer of admission.

Example: you have uploaded documentation for an Argentinian citizenship in your application. You are offered admission as a fee paying non EU citizen. You later send us documentation for an Italian citizenship (dual citizenship). We are not able to offer your admission as an EU citizen as we have used our quota for EU citizens and we are by law not allowed to accept you as a non EU fee paying citizen. We therefore have to withdraw your offer of admission.