Goldsmiths, University of London, formerly Goldsmiths College, University of London, is a
constituent research university
A research university or a research-intensive university is a university that is committed to research as a central part of its mission. They are "the key sites of Knowledge production modes, knowledge production", along with "intergenerational ...
of the
University of London
The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a collegiate university, federal Public university, public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The ...
. It was originally founded in 1891 as The Goldsmiths' Technical and Recreative Institute by the
Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths
The Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths (commonly known as ''The Goldsmiths' Company'' and formally styled ''The Wardens and Commonalty of the Mystery of Goldsmiths of the City of London''), is one of the Great Twelve Livery Companies of the City ...
in
New Cross
New Cross is an area in south-east London, England, south-east of Charing Cross in the London Borough of Lewisham and the London_postal_district#List_of_London_postal_districts, SE14 postcode district. New Cross is near St Johns, London, St Jo ...
, London. It was renamed Goldsmiths' College after being acquired by the University of London in 1904, and specialises in the arts, design, computing, humanities and social sciences. The main building on campus, known as the Richard Hoggart Building, was originally opened in 1844 and is the site of the former
Royal Naval School
The Royal Naval School was an English school that was established in Camberwell, London, in 1833 and then formally constituted by the ( 3 & 4 Vict. c. lxxxvi). It was a charitable institution, established as a boarding school for the sons ...
.
According to
Quacquarelli Symonds
Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) is a higher education analyst and a for-profit services provider headquartered in London with offices in Europe, Asia, and the Americas.
History
The company was founded by Nunzio Quacquarelli in 1990 to provide informati ...
(2021), Goldsmiths ranks 12th in Communication and Media Studies, 15th in Art & Design and is ranked in the top 50 in the areas of Anthropology, Sociology and the Performing Arts. In 2020, the university enrolled over 10,000 students at undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
37% of students come from outside the United Kingdom and 52% of all undergraduates are mature students (aged 21 or over at the start of their studies). Additionally, around a third of students at Goldsmiths are postgraduate students.
History
Founding

In 1891, the
Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths
The Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths (commonly known as ''The Goldsmiths' Company'' and formally styled ''The Wardens and Commonalty of the Mystery of Goldsmiths of the City of London''), is one of the Great Twelve Livery Companies of the City ...
, one of the
Livery Companies
A livery company is a type of guild or professional association that originated in medieval times in London, England. Livery companies comprise London's ancient and modern trade associations and guilds, almost all of which are Style (form of a ...
of the
City of London
The City of London, also known as ''the City'', is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county and Districts of England, local government district with City status in the United Kingdom, city status in England. It is the Old town, his ...
, founded ''The Goldsmiths' Technical and Recreative Institute'' (more commonly referred to simply as the "Goldsmiths' Institute"). The Goldsmiths' Company was established in the 12th century as a medieval guild for goldsmiths, silversmiths, and jewellers. The Livery Company dedicated the foundation of its new Institute to "the promotion of technical skill, knowledge, health and general well-being among men and women of the industrial, working and artisan classes". The original Institute was based in
New Cross
New Cross is an area in south-east London, England, south-east of Charing Cross in the London Borough of Lewisham and the London_postal_district#List_of_London_postal_districts, SE14 postcode district. New Cross is near St Johns, London, St Jo ...
at the site of the former
Royal Naval School
The Royal Naval School was an English school that was established in Camberwell, London, in 1833 and then formally constituted by the ( 3 & 4 Vict. c. lxxxvi). It was a charitable institution, established as a boarding school for the sons ...
; the building, now known as the ''Richard Hoggart Building'', remains the main building of the campus today.
20th century
In 1904, the institute was merged with the University of London and was re-established as Goldsmiths' College (the apostrophe was removed in 1993, and the word "College" dropped in a rebranding in 2006). At this point Goldsmiths was the largest teacher training institution in the country. Training functions were later expanded to include refresher courses for teachers, the University Postgraduate Certificate in Education and an Art teacher's Certificate course. The college also ran its own Nursery School.
Shortly after the merger, in 1907, Goldsmiths added a new Arts building, designed by Sir
Reginald Blomfield, at the back of the main building. During the Second World War it was decided to evacuate the faculty and students of the college to
University College, Nottingham, a decision which proved wise both at the time and in hindsight, since the main building was struck by an
incendiary bomb
Incendiary weapons, incendiary devices, incendiary munitions, or incendiary bombs are weapons designed to start fires. They may destroy structures or sensitive equipment using fire, and sometimes operate as anti-personnel weaponry. Incendiarie ...
and gutted in 1940 (and not finally repaired until 1947).
During the 1960s, Goldsmiths experienced a rapid expansion in student numbers. It is during this period that Goldsmiths began to establish its reputation in the arts and
social science
Social science (often rendered in the plural as the social sciences) is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of societies and the relationships among members within those societies. The term was formerly used to refer to the ...
fields, as well as offering a number of new teacher training qualifications. The original main building was expanded, and the Lockwood Building, Whitehead Building, Education Building, Warmington Tower and St James's Hall were all built to accommodate the influx of new students. The university also acquired a number of historic buildings in the surrounding area, including the splendid former
Deptford Town Hall and Laurie Grove Baths buildings. The Richard Hoggart Building, Deptford Town Hall and the Laurie Grove Baths all retain
Grade II listed
In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, H ...
-building status.
In 1988, Goldsmiths became a full College of the University of London and in 1990 received its
Royal Charter
A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, but ...
.
21st century
In 2018, the former boiler house and public laundry of Laurie Grove Baths was refurbished and opened as
Goldsmiths CCA.
In August 2019, Goldsmiths announced that it would be removing all beef products from sale and would be charging a 10p levy on bottled water and single-use plastic cups. The changes were introduced as part of the university's efforts to become carbon neutral by 2025.
Financial difficulties and restructuring
In 2019, Goldsmiths ran a deficit and
Frances Corner became Warden;
Corner's administration was regularly opposed by faculty and students over governance and financial strategy.
In January 2020, Goldsmiths proposed to cut costs by 15% over two years in the "Evolving Goldsmiths" plan by reducing faculty and centralizing administration. According to the Goldsmiths University and College Union (UCU), the plan did not address the causes of the deficit, which it attributed in part to overoptimistic enrolment forecasts and excessive capital expenditures. Furthermore, UCU warned that cuts to faculty would increase the deficit by reducing the income stream of tuition fees, which accounted for 77% of the College's revenue in the 2019-2020 fiscal year. "Evolving Goldsmiths" was "closed" in April 2022. In summer 2020, the UCU proposed selling "underused" property to build cash reserves; this was not done. Goldsmiths consolidated and refinanced its loans through
NatWest
National Westminster Bank, trading as NatWest, is a major Retail banking, retail and commercial bank in the United Kingdom based in London, England. It was established in 1968 by the Corporate merger, merger of National Provincial Bank and We ...
and
Lloyds Bank
Lloyds Bank plc is a major British retail banking, retail and commercial bank with a significant presence across England and Wales. It has traditionally been regarded one of the "Big Four (banking)#England and Wales, Big Four" clearing house ...
; the banks required the College to consult
KPMG
KPMG is a multinational professional services network, based in London, United Kingdom. As one of the Big Four accounting firms, along with Ernst & Young (EY), Deloitte, and PwC. KPMG is a network of firms in 145 countries with 275,288 emplo ...
to discover cost saving opportunities.
The 2021 "recovery plan" included elimination of 52 faculty and staff positions. Goldsmiths identified additional costs from
COVID-19
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. In January 2020, the disease spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic.
The symptoms of COVID‑19 can vary but often include fever ...
and over-staffing caused increased competition for student applications following the removal of limits on student numbers by the government.
According to the UCU in March 2022, the College refused to stop layoffs although savings from voluntary resignations and maintaining vacancies exceeded the requirements of the banks. Administrative was concentrated into a central hub in 2021-2022; the resulting "chaos" reduced the number of enrolments by international students; international students are a critical revenue steam.
Through 2021, Corner also charged the College nearly for taxi fares, with being for personal use.
The "Transformation Programme", announced in early 2024, included the elimination of 132 full-time, or equivalent, positions, or 17% of all staff, with some departments being reduced by 50%. The plan was expected to be completed by September. According to ''The Guardian'', the extent of the cuts would radically change the university's culture.
In August 2024, the UCU announced that it had prevented compulsory redundancies for the 2024/25 academic year.
Campus and location
Goldsmiths is situated in
New Cross
New Cross is an area in south-east London, England, south-east of Charing Cross in the London Borough of Lewisham and the London_postal_district#List_of_London_postal_districts, SE14 postcode district. New Cross is near St Johns, London, St Jo ...
, a highly populated area of
south-east London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
.
The main building, the Richard Hoggart Building, was originally designed as a school (opened in 1844) by the architect
John Shaw, Jr (1803–1870). The former Deptford Town Hall building, designed by
Henry Vaughan Lanchester and
Edwin Alfred Rickards, acquired in 1998, is used for academic seminars and conferences. In addition to this Goldsmiths has built several more modern buildings to develop the campus, including the
RIBA
''Riba'' (, or , ) is an Arabic word used in Islamic law and roughly translated as " usury": unjust, exploitative gains made in trade or business. ''Riba'' is mentioned and condemned in several different verses in the Qur'an3:130
award-winning Rutherford Building completed in 1997, the ''Ben Pimlott Building'' designed by
Will Alsop
William Allen Alsop (12 December 1947 – 12 May 2018) was a British architect and Professor of Architecture at University for the Creative Arts's Canterbury School of Architecture.
He was responsible for several distinctive and controversial ...
and completed in 2005, and the ''Professor Stuart Hall Building'' (formerly the ''New Academic Building''), which was completed in 2010.
The library, or the Rutherford Building', has three floors and gives students access to an extensive range of printed and electronic resources. Goldsmiths' students, like all other students in the University of London, have full access to the collections at
Senate House Library at
Bloomsbury
Bloomsbury is a district in the West End of London, part of the London Borough of Camden in England. It is considered a fashionable residential area, and is the location of numerous cultural institution, cultural, intellectual, and educational ...
in central London.
The seven-storey ''Ben Pimlott Building'' on New Cross Road, complete with its distinctive "scribble in the sky" (made from 229 separate pieces of metal) has become a signature of modern Goldsmiths. It contains studio and teaching space for the Department of Art, as well as housing the Goldsmiths Digital Studios and the Centre for Cognition, Computation and Culture.
The ''Professor Stuart Hall Building'', situated next to the green, is home to the Media and Communications Department and the Institute for Creative and Cultural Entrepreneurship (ICCE). Formerly the ''New Academic Building)'', in 2014 it was renamed after cultural theorist
Stuart Hall. Facilities include a 250-seat lecture theatre, seminar and teaching rooms, as well as a cafe with outdoor seating.
Academic profile
Faculties and departments
Art
The Head of Department is Richard Noble. Notable alumni include
Damien Hirst
Damien Steven Hirst (; né Brennan; born 7 June 1965) is an English artist and art collector. He was one of the Young British Artists (YBAs) who dominated the art scene in the UK during the 1990s. He is reportedly the United Kingdom's richest ...
,
Sarah Lucas,
Steve McQueen
Terrence Stephen McQueen (March 24, 1930November 7, 1980) was an American actor. His antihero persona, emphasized during the height of counterculture of the 1960s, 1960s counterculture, made him a top box office draw for his films of the late ...
,
Gillian Wearing,
Fiona Banner,
Angela Bulloch
Angela Bulloch (born 1966 in Rainy River, Ontario, Canada), is a Canadian artist who often works with sound and installation; she is recognised as one of the Young British Artists. Bulloch lives and works in Berlin.
Life and career
Bulloch stud ...
,
Hamad Butt, and
Graham Coxon.
The university is also a member of the
Screen Studies Group, London.
Design
The Department of Design's approach to design practice grew from a concern for ethical and environmentalist design. This developed alongside research by
John Wood,
Julia Lockheart, and others, which informs their research into
metadesign. TERU, the Technology Education Research Unit, has been instrumental in understanding how design and technology work in schools, how to encourage learners towards creative interventions that improve the made world, and how to help teachers to support that process. The Writing Purposefully in Art and Design Network (Writing-PAD) has its main Centre at Goldsmiths. The Network now spans about 70 institutions across the art and design sector with 6 national and 2 International Writing PAD Centres.
Computing
The Department of Computing lets students develop their creative potential while learning solid computing skills with programs focused on Computer Science, Computer Games Art & Design, Computational Technology, Computational Cognitive Neuroscience, Computer Games Programming, Computational Linguistics, Data Science, User Experience Engineering, and Virtual & Augmented Reality.
Sociology
The
Sociology
Sociology is the scientific study of human society that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. The term sociol ...
Department include
Nirmal Puwar, and
Les Back.
Cultural studies
The Media and Communications Department, as well as the Centre for Cultural Studies, include
Matthew Fuller,
Scott Lash,
Angela McRobbie
Angela McRobbie (born 1951) is a British cultural theorist, feminist, and commentator whose work combines the study of popular culture, contemporary media practices and feminism through conceptions of a third-person reflexive gaze. She is a pro ...
,
Nirmal Puwar and (formerly)
Sara Ahmed.
Institute for Creative and Cultural Entrepreneurship
The Institute for Creative and Cultural Entrepreneurship delivers entrepreneurship, cultural management and policy education to the creative and cultural sectors.
Anthropology
The Department of Anthropology teaching staff include
Keith Hart and (formerly)
David Graeber
David Rolfe Graeber (; February 12, 1961 – September 2, 2020) was an American and British anthropologist, Left-wing politics, left-wing and anarchism, anarchist social and political activist. His influential work in Social anthropology, social ...
. The department is known for its focus on visual anthropology. The realm of continental philosophy is represented with academics such as
Saul Newman, as well as Visiting Professors
Andrew Benjamin and
Bernard Stiegler
Bernard Stiegler (; 1 April 1952 – 5 August 2020) was a French philosopher. He was head of the Institut de recherche et d'innovation (IRI), which he founded in 2006 at the Centre Georges-Pompidou. He was also founder of the political and c ...
. In the area of Psychology there is
Chris French
Christopher (Chris) Charles French (born 1956) is a British psychologist who is prominent in the field of anomalistic psychology, with a focus on the psychology of paranormal beliefs and anomalous experiences. In addition to his academic activ ...
who specialises in the psychology of
paranormal
Paranormal events are purported phenomena described in popular culture, folk, and other non-scientific bodies of knowledge, whose existence within these contexts is described as being beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding. Not ...
beliefs and experiences, cognition and emotion.
Saul Newman – notable for developing the concept of
post-anarchism – is currently leading the department of politics.
English and comparative literature
The English & Comparative Literature Department covers English, comparative literature, American literature, creative writing and linguistics. Current academics include
Blake Morrison
Philip Blake Morrison (born 8 October 1950) is an English poet and author who has published in a wide range of fiction and non-fiction genres. His greatest success came with the publication of his memoirs ''And When Did You Last See Your Father?' ...
and
Chris Baldick.
Music
The
Research Centre for Russian Music, convened by
Alexander Ivashkin until his death in 2014, is internationally renowned for its archives devoted to
Prokofiev
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev; alternative transliterations of his name include ''Sergey'' or ''Serge'', and ''Prokofief'', ''Prokofieff'', or ''Prokofyev''. , group=n ( – 5 March 1953) was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor who l ...
and
Schnittke, and unique collections including of music by
Stravinsky
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ( – 6 April 1971) was a Russian composer and conductor with French citizenship (from 1934) and American citizenship (from 1945). He is widely considered one of the most important and influential composers of ...
, and first editions of Russian Piano Music.
Other research centres at the department include the Unit for Sound Practice Research co-founded and co-directed by John Levack Drever, Contemporary Music Research Group, Asian Music Unit, Afghanistan Music Unit, Fringe and Underground Music Group, and the Centre for Music and Ethnographic Film.
The Sonic Scope Journal of Audiovisual Studies is based in the department.
The department curates the annual PureGold festival, which takes place during May and June in venues across South-East London including the Albany Theatre, Deptford. It continues with PureGold
EDUX which showcases postgraduate students in September, with a final MMus show in November, with work from Creative Practice, Composition, Sonic Arts, Performance & Related Studies and Popular Music students.
The department houses two recording studios: Goldsmiths Music Studios, and the
Stanley Glasser Electronic Music Studios, established in 1968 by the composer, instrument maker, and musicologist Hugh Davies.
NX Records, an independent record label, is a collaboration between
Matthew Herbert
Matthew Herbert (born in 1972), also known as Herbert, Doctor Rockit, Radio Boy, Mr. Vertigo, Transformer, Wishmountain, and DJ Empty, is a British electronic musician. He often takes sounds from everyday items to produce electronic music.
...
's Accidental Records and the Department of Music.
Educational studies
The Department of Educational Studies teaches undergraduate, masters and doctoral courses, and is home to a large programme of initial teacher education (primary and secondary), based on partnership arrangements with over 1500 schools and colleges.
Additional academic programmes
Goldsmiths paired with
Tungsten Network in 2015 to develop a research programme that explores advanced artificial intelligence techniques for
Big Data
Big data primarily refers to data sets that are too large or complex to be dealt with by traditional data processing, data-processing application software, software. Data with many entries (rows) offer greater statistical power, while data with ...
and business practices. Known as Tungsten Centre for Intelligent Data Analytics, the programme is based in the company's London office.
Rankings
QS World University Rankings ranked Goldsmiths' media and communications offerings as second in the UK and eighth worldwide in 2017, and second and eleventh respectively in 2023.
Open access to research by Goldsmiths academics
Goldsmiths Research Online (GRO) is a repository of research publications and other research outputs conducted by academics at Goldsmiths. The repository also holds Goldsmiths' collection of doctoral theses. GRO is part of Goldsmiths Online Research Collections (ORC) which also includes Goldsmiths Journals Online (GOJO), a hosting platform for
open access
Open access (OA) is a set of principles and a range of practices through which nominally copyrightable publications are delivered to readers free of access charges or other barriers. With open access strictly defined (according to the 2001 de ...
journals and conference proceedings.
Student life
Sports, clubs and traditions
Sports teams and societies are organised by the
Goldsmiths Students' Union. The Union runs multiple sports clubs which compete in
BUCS
British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS; ) is the governing body for higher education sport in the United Kingdom.
Founded in 2008, BUCS is responsible for organising 54 inter-university sports in the United Kingdom, as well as represe ...
leagues. The Students' Union also runs numerous societies.
Student media
Goldsmiths has a long history of student-led media platforms, including ''Smiths Magazine'', ''The Leopard'' newspaper, and Wired radio. The student media is run independently by students at the college.
Student housing
Accommodation Services offers accommodation within seven halls:
* Loring Hall
* Ewen Henderson Court
* Quantum Court
* Town Hall Camberwell
* Surrey House
* Chesterman House
* Raymont Hall
Electricity, internet and gas bills are included in the rent.
Students' Union
The union provides academic representation for students through elected
sabbatical officers. It also provides an advice service on academic issues and a provision of sports clubs and societies.
Notable alumni
See also
*
Armorial of UK universities
The armorial of British universities is the collection of coats of arms of universities in the United Kingdom. Modern arms of universities began appearing in England around the middle of the 15th century, with University of Oxford, Oxford's being ...
*
E-scape
*
Forensic Architecture
*
Goldsmiths CCA
*
List of Goldsmiths College people
*
List of universities in the UK
References
External links
*
The official Goldsmiths Students' Union websiteGoldsmiths, University of London lists of studentsGoldsmiths, University of London military personnel, 1914–1918
{{authority control
Education in the London Borough of Lewisham
Universities and colleges established in 1891
Grade II listed educational buildings
Grade II listed buildings in the London Borough of Lewisham
1891 establishments in England
New Cross
Organisations based in the London Borough of Lewisham
1891 in London
Universities UK
University of London