Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama

The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama is the national conservatoire of Wales, based in Cardiff. It opened in 1949 as the Cardiff College of Music, later added drama, and received its royal title in 2002. The college occupies a purpose-built campus beside Bute Park and Cardiff Castle. It is a specialist conservatoire rather than a multi-faculty university, with professional performance houses on site, including the Dora Stoutzker Hall and the Richard Burton Theatre.

Teaching is organized around music and drama. Music covers classical performance, composition, conducting, jazz, and musical theatre; drama covers acting, stage management, theatre design, and production crafts. Graduate students train in studios and through public concert and theatre seasons that form part of the course, using the college's concert hall, theatres, and rehearsal rooms rather than a conventional lecture-based faculty structure.

The college enrolls on the order of 800 students, with a substantial postgraduate group in performance and production. Students come from Wales, the rest of the United Kingdom, and overseas. Teaching staff are working performers, directors, and composers. Alumni work in opera, theatre, film, and orchestras in Britain and abroad.

Graduate study is through taught master's degrees such as the MA and MMus, built on one-to-one tuition, ensemble or production work, and assessed performances rather than a large lecture load. The year follows the UK conservatoire pattern of terms organized around rehearsals and public shows. Students live in Cardiff and work within reach of Welsh National Opera, BBC Cymru Wales, and the city's theatres.

In the Grad School Navigator directory, Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama lists 2 graduate programs in environmental design, all of them master's programs.