Aircraft design is a complex multi-disciplinary task and teaching can easily tend to be too theoretical, not providing the students the tools they need to successfully participate in industrial projects. The approach chosen at Linköping University is intended to create the right balance between theory and practice, and to place the student in the centre of the problem, in order to achieve an overall perspective of the aircraft design process. This article presents in brief layout of the courses, and in more detail, the aircraft design project course given in the last year of the aeronautical masters program, where flying hardware is designed and build, in response to a design challenge. © IMechE 2007.