Naba focuses on international development and opens in London

After Milan and Rome, it is now London's turn: the English capital will in fact host the first branch of Naba, acronym for New Academy of Fine Arts, beyond national borders. The opening of the campus, about two thousand square metres inside the Olympic Park, is scheduled for October 2026 with three three-year courses in fashion and design.

This is the first major investment abroad for the institute, which is part of the international group Galileo Global Education, and the first test on foreign markets for a reality that, in Italy, welcomes more than one out of three students from abroad: "Naba has almost fifty years of history, but in the last twenty years it has grown exponentially," said Daniele Bisello o Ragno, managing director of Naba. With about 6,000 students it is the largest academy of fine arts in Italy as well as the most international: the share of foreign students is 35% of the total and will soon reach 40%. A research carried out by Doxa, to be published soon, calculates that 9 out of 10 students have a job (internship included) one year after graduation.Naba is now also the first Italian Academy of Fine Arts to be recognised in the UK. By virtue of this, we also needed to get out of the national perimeter: putting a foot in a city like London, an international reference point, is the first step. And I believe it will become a strategic move towards other markets, European and otherwise'.

Among the foreign students attending schools in Milan and London, there are many Scandinavians, but also Turks. These nationalities have made up for the lower attendance from China.

The new London location - the third after Milan and Rome - will start in conjunction with the start of the 2026/27 academic year and with three main study tracks: Design, Fashion design and Fashion marketing management. New courses will also be added in the visual arts and multimedia segment which, says Bisello o Ragno, "have a large following especially among Chinese students".

The programmes - in English - are designed 'in osmosis' with those of Italian schools, with a practical orientation, thanks to the workshops, interdisciplinary and connected to the world of work. The professors will be based in London, given the large parterre "of Italian professionals who over the years have moved to the English capital to work in fashion, design and art". But links with Italy are not excluded, both in terms of 'exchanges' with schools in Milan and Rome, and in terms of internships: 'The placement office will be shared,' says the managing director.