Store Concept Designer, Brands in London

We have a 12 month opportunity for a Concept Designer who will predominantly work with 3rd party brands, ensuring all their designs fit into our selling landscape. As a Concept Designer, you will be at the heart of transforming the John Lewis shopping experience. This is a role for a person who understands that great retail is about more than just fixtures; it’s about storytelling. You will be instrumental in bringing new brands into our stores, working collaboratively with external partners and internal stakeholders to agree bespoke concepts that seamlessly blend their brand identity with our own store environments. You will be expected to push brands to deliver their best possible solutions in order to create innovative and market-leading retail. By balancing creative flair with commercial objectives, you will ensure every new brand launch or department refresh delivers a "wow" moment for our customers.

What you’ll do:

• Brand Collaboration: Work hand-in-hand with new and emerging brands and the commercial teams to co-develop concept design solutions that resonate with our customers while pushing the boundaries of traditional retail.
• Creative Excellence: Support the Concept Design Managers and the wider team in building a Centre of Excellence, driving a high-performance culture that sets the creative direction, look, and feel for the John Lewis estate.
• Cross-Functional Synergy: Work collaboratively with internal teams, such as Space Planning, Store Design, Property, Visual Merchandising, and Commercial teams to ensure all concepts are not only aesthetically pleasing but also affordable, efficient, safe and optimised for space.
• Commercial Innovation: Deliver designs that exceed customer expectations while remaining benchmarked against the best in the industry, ensuring cost-efficiency through smart design and planning.

While the main focus for these 12 months will be working with 3rd party brands and their designs, you may also do some internal concept design projects. This generally entails taking commercial briefs and turning them into deliverable propositions, working with all areas of the business and external teams. You will be more than a designer; you will be an architect of experience, helping us define what the future of the British high street looks like.

Expected salary: Salary up to £50,000 depending on experience.

Contract type: This is a 12 month fixed term contract opportunity.

Hours and location of the role: 35 hours per week. Your home location will be our London Pimlico Head Office. The Partnership has adopted a hybrid working approach meaning you’ll be able to work a mixture between the office and home based upon your personal needs whilst balancing the needs of the business. The team attends the office 3 days a week. Monday and Tuesday are core days, with the 3rd day being flexible across Wednesday, Thursday or Friday. The third day is also often used to visit branches or suppliers.

Key responsibilities:

• Create and develop design concept solutions to meet design and commercial briefs.
• Help define the John Lewis look and feel, delivering a consistent approach to the store environment, brand look & feel and customer areas.
• Contribute to and maintain a thorough understanding of store design planning principles, the overall look and feel of John Lewis, shop fit, equipment and related capital and operational costs.
• Has the skill, ability and knowledge to take a concept from idea through to store planning and implementation, including acting on stakeholder feedback, reviewing prototypes and taking it through our internal processes for approvals.
• Design with cost in mind, working with our supply chain to develop the most affordable, effective materials and construction method.
• Maintain excellent working relationships with all cross functional work streams and third party agencies.
• Provide clear planning guidelines for new design solutions and end users in the branch.
• Ensure all design solutions are in line with John Lewis brand guidelines and sustainability targets.
• Set and manage clear brief, timelines, risks, issues for all projects.
• All department store shop fit and equipment design changes are clearly tracked and communicated.
• Coordinate with Store Designers and other teams in a timely manner in-line with agreed internal and cross functional processes.
• Ensure due diligence on all elements of the process and work is effectively developed, documented, managed and delivered for all design solutions.
• Ensure all Health & Safety and DDA requirements are met and the approval level of due diligence has been completed.

The successful candidate will have the following skills:

• Experience working with brands and their designs.
• Understanding commercial and customer needs to design world class retail.
• Ability to develop a concept from idea through to delivery.
• Expert in 3D design, retail design, FF&E design.
• Ability to create concept sketches, visuals and mood boards.
• Stakeholder management.
• Designing to a budget.
• Ability to work on a number of projects at once.
• Work and deliver to challenging timelines set by the business.
• Translating Brand strategy and Customer insight into the designs.
• Understanding how Retail operations affect the designs from operations and running costs.
• Strong presentation skills, able to present confidently to senior stakeholders.

Essential skills and/or experience you’ll need:

• Experience working with brands and their designs.
• Proven experience with 3D design skills with understanding of materials and construction.
• Working experience of AutoCAD, In-design, Sketch up & Photoshop.
• Proven experience of working within in-house design teams or design agencies.
• BA Hons in 3D Design or similar (e.g. Interior Architecture, Retail design, Product design etc).
• Experience of working with and managing 3rd party resource (e.g. architects and shopfitters).
• Experience of managing a wide range of projects simultaneously.

About The Partnership: We’re the largest employee owned business in the UK and home of our cherished brands, John Lewis and Waitrose. We’re not just employees, we’re Partners, driven by our purpose to build a happier world. As we look to our future, there’s never been a more exciting time to join us. We’re ruthlessly focused on being brilliant at retail. We continue to innovate, adapt and diversify. Never Knowingly Undersold on price, quality and service in John Lewis and passionately serving food-lovers in Waitrose. As Partners we all share the responsibility of ownership and in its rewards. We use our voices to contribute to our success, working together through the good and challenging times, holding true to our behaviours and treating everyone with kindness and respect. We all own making the Partnership somewhere we belong. Embracing our differences and creating an environment where we’re free to be ourselves and can THRIVE. Growing ourselves individually, and as a collective. As Partners, we make all the difference. And, we all own it.

Important points to note: It’s important to note that some of our roles are subject to pre-employment vetting (which may include DBS checks for successful candidates). If required, you’ll be informed and provided with information about vetting during the recruitment process and we encourage you to complete any vetting documents quickly to avoid delays. Any DBS checks required will be carried out by a third-party registered body and financial probity checks may also be required for some of our roles. We occasionally close vacancies early in the event we receive a high volume of applications, and therefore, we recommend you apply early. If you require a reasonable adjustment due to a disability which means you may need longer to complete your application please contact us as soon as possible. We want all of our Partners to have a good work-life balance and we support flexible working. This might mean flexible or compressed hours, job sharing or shorter hour contracts, where possible. Please discuss this further with the hiring manager during your interview.