Founded in 1930 and located in Pasadena, California, Art Center College of Design is a global leader in design and art education. Art Center offers 11 undergraduate and six graduate degrees in a wide variety of design and art disciplines, as well as public programs for all ages and levels of experience. Renowned for its ties to industry, Art Center is the first design school to receive the United Nations’ Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) status, providing opportunities for students to create design-based solutions for humanitarian and nonprofit agencies around the world. During the College’s 84-year history, Art Center’s alumni have had a profound impact on popular culture, on the way we live and on important issues in our society.
Art Center’s Graduate Industrial Design (Grad ID) Department is consistently ranked at the very top by the Design Futures Council in its Design Intelligence survey for America’s best architecture and design schools, and at the top of U.S. News and World Report’s annual Best Graduate Schools rankings. Grad ID alumni occupy top strategy positions at innovative organizations such as LEGO Concept Lab, Second Road, Toyota, Microsoft and Nokia Research Center.
The Grad ID faculty, most of whom are internationally renowned working professionals, have played key creative and leadership roles at firms such as The Walt Disney Company, S. G. Hauser Associates, Henry Dreyfuss Associates, RTKL Associates, bioDesigns, Roundarch and Human Code. Students have collaborated with clients such as Herman Miller, Avery Dennison, GUESS, Warner Bros. Records, Empire-Berol, Hewlett-Packard, Honda, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, LEGO, Yahoo!, Volvo Trucks, and many other companies.