Senior Design Director, Publishing Platform in City of Westminster

CondéNast is a global media company producing the highest quality content with a footprint of more than 1 billion consumers in 32 territories through print, digital, video and social platforms. The company’s portfolio includes many of the world’s most respected and influential media properties including Vogue, VanityFair, Glamour, Self, GQ, The NewYorker, CondéNastTraveler/Traveller, Allure, AD, BonAppétit and Wired, among others.

Opportunity

CondéNast thrives on collaboration, and our teams come together in the office four days a week (Monday–Thursday). We value diversity of background, views and cultures. We celebrate people for their personal qualities, skills and contributions, recognizing the power our brands have to influence and shape culture. This is a rare opportunity to define the foundational design layer of some of the world’s most storied media brands – and to do it at a moment when what “platform design” means is genuinely changing. The Publishing Platform group sits at the heart of how CondéNast’s brands are built, expressed, and experienced at scale.

Responsibilities

• Define the design vision for the Publishing Platform, collaborating with Product and Engineering to set a clear, shared, and actionable direction for the team and cross‑functional partners.
• Own the line between scale and expression, making principled decisions on platform unification vs bespoke solutions and acting as a credible, evidence‑based advocate for both sides.
• Lead through craft, coaching and sharing expertise, setting standards via hands‑on work while building the capability of the team.
• Bring technical depth, understanding front‑end architecture, design systems, performance trade‑offs, and ensuring alignment with engineering.
• Lead with AI by developing an evolving point of view on AI’s role in platform design, using AI tools in practice, and establishing best‑practice frameworks.
• Partner and influence cross‑functionally by building trusted relationships with Product, Engineering, Editorial and Revenue leadership and representing design in high‑stakes conversations.
• Embed an insights‑driven, outcomes‑oriented approach by championing measurement and learning, connecting design decisions to measurable outcomes, and aligning with business metrics.
• Build and develop the team by attracting, developing and retaining senior design talent, structuring the team for change, and fostering psychological safety.

Success Criteria

In the first six months, you will have built trust and a clear, well‑grounded point of view on how the platform foundations need to evolve, and you will have started acting on it with early, measurable improvements. By the end of the first year, that point of view will be in motion, the quality bar of user experiences will be higher, the team will be working in new ways, and the organisation will be aligned around a shared vision for the platform.

Qualifications

• Substantial experience leading platform‑level, systems‑oriented design – including design systems, component libraries, or shared publishing tooling – with a track record of shipping at scale across multiple brands.
• Deep technical fluency in front‑end architecture, design tokens, component design, theming systems, accessibility and performance trade‑offs.
• A hands‑on, evolving relationship with AI tooling and active curiosity about its future impact.
• Sophisticated understanding of typography, narrative structure, visual storytelling and the specific challenges of publishing products.
• Demonstrated ability to lead as a player‑coach: setting standards through doing, raising craft, and building team capability.
• Experience leading design teams through significant change or organisational flux, building confidence and momentum.
• Proven ability to attract, develop and grow senior design talent, including emerging people managers, across a global and distributed organisation.
• Comfort thinking about org design – how to structure a team, specialise, and evolve as the portfolio grows.
• Principled approach to the tension between platform unification and brand expression, with experience making and defending those calls.
• Fluency in the commercial dimensions of a publishing platform – subscriptions, advertising, loyalty – sufficient to partner credibly with product leadership.
• Excellent communication, facilitation and storytelling skills; ability to influence senior stakeholders and technical partners alike.
• Experience leveraging OKR frameworks to connect design direction to measurable business outcomes.

Bonus

• Experience working in media, publishing or content‑led consumer products, or in large global organisations with distributed teams across multiple time zones.

About CondéNast Technology

CondéNast Technology builds the products, systems and experiences that power our brands – from Vogue and The NewYorker to GQ, Wired and VanityFair. Our mission is to enable creativity and business growth through next‑generation publishing, loyalty and commerce platforms. We are a global team of designers, engineers, product managers and researchers working across London, NewYork and twelve other markets.

What we offer

• 25 days holiday (plus bank holidays) and extra days of annual leave if you move house or want to volunteer.
• A competitive pension scheme, Bupa Private Healthcare, season ticket loans and eye tests.
• Tools to support wellbeing: core hours, 10 remote days (home or a country with a CondéNast office), Employee Assistance Programme, corporate gym membership and cycle‑to‑work scheme.
• A dog‑friendly office, discounts and magazine subscriptions.
• Personal and professional growth through the CondéNast Learning Hub, with a portfolio of learning courses and training.
• Employee Resource Groups that provide a platform for employees to identify shared objectives, exchange ideas, and work on community priorities.

Equal Opportunity Employer

CondéNast is an equal‑opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, colour, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, age, familial status and other legally protected characteristics.

Application Process

If you are interested, please apply below; we will review your application as soon as possible. You can update your résumé or upload a cover letter at any time by accessing your candidate profile. CondéNast values the time and effort behind every application. All submissions are reviewed by a member of our talent team – we don’t use AI‑assisted technology to review applications.

For more information, please visit condenast.com. Follow @CondeNast and @CondeNastCareer on Twitter and @condenastcareers on Instagram.