The PhD and MPhil in Landscape Architecture is for those with a background in landscape architecture (or adjacent field) who wish to pursue a rigorous piece of academic scholarship under specialist supervisory guidance.

We welcome applicants with a strong idea of what they want to research and how they will carry it out. You will be expected to conduct fieldwork and engage with primary source materials, interpreting this alongside existing literature in the field. The aim of the research programme is to make an original and substantial contribution to knowledge in a chosen topic of study.

Themes include:

• cultural landscapes and critical heritage studies
• multispecies studies  
• time and environment
• spatial and environmental justice
• landscape experience and aesthetics
• climate futures and risk landscapes
• urban theory and infrastructure
• decolonial epistemologies
• practice-based landscape architectural design research (including community-based projects)
• landscape and wellbeing (within OPENspace research centre)
• computational and GIS spatial research methods

Following the achievement of the MPhil degree you may enter an academic career and eventually move into a PhD programme or choose to go into practice. A PhD allows you to seek post-doc or other academic positions as a lecturer or researcher, depending on your preferences. Many PhD students are also staff members at overseas universities and the PhD allows them to follow an academic career path once they return to their home institution.

If you'd like to study on a postgraduate research programme at Edinburgh College of Art, you must apply through EUCLID, our online application system. You can find out how to do this on the University of Edinburgh website, where you'll also be able to:

• See detailed entrance requirements for each programme on the Degree Finder
• Get information on what to expect after you apply
• Find out about study modes, start dates and fees
• Find out if, and how, you need to submit a portfolio, showreel or research proposal
• Find out where to go for further advice and guidance.

Read the University of Edinburgh's student terms and conditions

Before you apply

As this is a research programme, support and supervision may be provided by any of the teaching staff in the Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (ESALA). You could also be supervised jointly, or by second supervision, by experts in other departments within the University of Edinburgh, including Geography, Health in Social Science, Education, Engineering, and History and Classics.   

Please ensure that at least one member of staff (see below) maintains an active research programme that aligns with the themes of your proposed project.  

Prospective students are strongly encouraged to make contact with the relevant member(s) of staff via email to explain your research interests prior to submitting an application. Please note that we only accept applications and review application materials submitted through the official EUCLID application portal.

After you apply

Once your application has been submitted for consideration, it will be sent to a team of academic reviewers for their attention. They will then make a decision about your application and research topic, and decide whether it is possible to make an offer of a place to study with us. You may be asked to attend a brief online interview but if this is the case, you will be notified in advance.