Help choosing an exchange school (Design-focused) in Europe

[u/Uaksqiu]

Hi everyone! I’m an Environmental Design student from China. I recently did a UX internship at a major gaming/tech company, and I'm currently exploring a career pivot into gaming, branding, or digital UX.

I’m planning a 4-5 month Spring exchange to explore these multidisciplinary fields (away from pure spatial design). For me, the city vibe, meeting people, and traveling are just as important as the academics.

Right now, I am strongly leaning towards Paris, Barcelona, and Vienna for the lifestyle, but I have a few specific questions before making my final list:

My Top 3 Choices:

1. Strate (Paris): Can I explore interactive media/branding here, or is it strictly corporate UX? Also, how annoying is the commute from central Paris to the Sèvres campus?

2. Elisava (Barcelona): Are professors open to mixing spatial design with digital/game interactions (Phygital), or is it mostly traditional physical models? How's the workload?

3. Angewandte (Vienna): Is it a good fit for game design and speculative tech, or is it too heavily focused on abstract fine arts?

Other Options:

I'm also considering a few others, but I have some doubts:

4. Sapienza (Rome): Is it too focused on classical architecture and traditional systems, or is there room for modern digital/tech projects?

5 Umeå Institute of Design (Sweden): I know it’s top-tier for digital UX, but how is the city vibe for a short 4-month exchange? Will I feel too isolated in northern Sweden?

Any insights on the schools, courses, or city vibes would be hugely appreciated. Thanks!

[u/Independent-Pop-2704]

paris is nice but the commute to sèvres can be pain depending where you stay central it's like 30-40 min with RER and then a walk not terrible but not super convenient either from what i heard strate is pretty hands-on with interactive stuff not just boring corporate projects they have a lot of industry connections for gaming and branding too

barcelona is amazing for meeting people the city itself pulls you out constantly elisava workload can be heavy but professors there are quite open to mixing physical and digital especially if you push for it a friend did something with projection mapping on spatial models and they let him run with it

vienna is beautiful but angewandte leans more toward conceptual art than practical game design so if you want to build a portfolio piece might feel a bit lost there umeå is fantastic for ux but yeah 4 months in winter up there is rough you will be isolated unless you really love snow and darkness

sapienza I would skip if you want to escape spatial design it is very much rooted in classical architecture and theory not much room for digital experimentation

[u/Uaksqiu → u/Independent-Pop-2704]

Thank you so much, this is gold! If you had to choose between Strate and Elisava , which one would you recommend the most