Creative Lead/ Designer in London

We are working on behalf of our client, an independent London agency, who is looking for a Senior Art Director/Creative Lead to sit just under the Creative Director. This person will be the one pushing ideas further, bringing original thinking, visual direction and cultural relevance to some very well-known premium brands. If you love ideas, brand worlds, and making things feel both premium and interesting this might be a good fit!

The role involves working across global drinks and lifestyle brands, taking strategy and turning it into strong creative territories, concepts and visual directions. You’ll partner with strategy and design to bring brand platforms, launches, gifting and toolkits to life in ways that feel fresh, on-brand and commercially smart.

This is less about being the neatest layout designer and more about being the person with the ideas, the references and the vision, who can still communicate that clearly and work with designers to land it.

What you’ll be doing:

• Working with creative directors and strategists to turn brand strategy into big, ownable creative territories
• Developing concepts for brand platforms, launches, gifting, toolkits, education pieces and campaigns
• Exploring how ideas play out across touchpoints, from decks and guidelines through to POS, activations and content
• Art directing shoots, visual assets and key visuals where needed
• Bringing cultural references and fresh thinking into the work, especially around premium and lifestyle audiences
• Collaborating closely with designers to turn rough ideas into polished, on-brand executions
• Presenting work internally and externally, telling a clear story from insight to idea to execution
• Helping raise the creative bar across the studio, especially on originality and distinctiveness

What you’ll bring:

• Experience as a Senior Art Director, senior designer with a strong conceptual bend, or similar creative lead role
• Strong portfolio across brand, packaging, campaigns or activations, ideally with premium / drinks / lifestyle work in the mix
• Confident at turning strategy into territories, ideas and visual directions (not just executing someone else’s idea)
• Comfortable working on toolkits, guidelines and “upstream” brand work, not just final campaign assets
• Able to sketch, mood board and reference clearly, and then guide designers on how to bring it to life
• A feel for what’s culturally relevant and fresh for premium brands (not just “disruptive for the sake of it”)
• Collaborative, open to building on others’ thinking, and happy in a close, in-studio team

Salary up to £60k depending on experience. Working pattern: full-time, mainly in the studio (with flexibility when needed and agreed). Role type: permanent, with room to grow into a bigger creative leadership position if it’s the right fit.