Design Innovation Jobs in Ithaca, NY (NOW HIRING)

Company Overview:MacKenzie-Childs is a leading home furnishings retail company known for its unique design, high-quality products and exceptional customer service. We specialize in offering a wide range of kitchen, entertaining, decor and furniture items that cater to various styles and preferences, ensuring our customers find exactly what they need to make their homes joyful and stylish.

Position Summary:

The Design Director is responsible for overall design concept, creative direction, and the execution of the design process. This role oversees designs from concept through completion, ensuring the team delivers two robust, timely, and cohesive collections each year, along with additional capsule collections as needed. This is achieved by establishing and maintaining streamlined processes that create the conditions for team success.

The Design Director serves as a leader within a collaborative environment, fostering a creative, productive, and highly engaged culture among a skilled and motivated team. Working cross-functionally with Product Development, Planning, Sales, and Production, the Design Director helps deliver compelling product assortments that support the organization's revenue growth objectives.

This position reports directly to the Chief Brand Officer / Creative Director, Rebecca Proctor.

Essential Job Duties and Responsibilities: (Additional duties may be assigned)

Directing Designers

• Lead the Design Team's workload, output, throughput, and professional development.
• Foster strong relationships, provide ongoing feedback, and advocate for the team across the organization.
• Coach prioritization and time management to ensure timely, high-quality delivery aligned with the Design & Development Cadence Calendar and budget.

Creating Conditions for Innovation

• Enable experimentation and cross-functional collaboration within a structured design process.
• Balance creativity with delivery deadlines and business priorities.
• Scale processes thoughtfully as the business grows, increasing efficiency and focus amid added complexity.

Directing the Design Process

• Continuously refine and evolve the design process to improve efficiency and effectiveness.
• Adjust workflows, milestones, and cross-departmental interfaces to maintain a dynamic and productive environment.
• Provide strategic oversight with strong big-picture and systems thinking.

Developing a Commercial Mindset

• Inspire a commercially driven approach while preserving the brand's creative identity.
• Conduct market and competitor research to identify whitespace and growth opportunities.
• Equip the team with tools and frameworks that strengthen commercial awareness in design decisions.

Producing Design Briefs

• Partner with the Chief Brand Officer, Design Assets Manager, and Design team to create two annual Design Briefs, plus additional capsule briefs as needed.
• Develop overarching themes, storyboards, mockups, and proprietary in-house artwork to guide seasonal storytelling and execution.
• Ensure briefs inspire internal teams, vendors, and agents across future seasons.
• Oversee development of in-house proprietary artwork that reinforces seasonal narratives and a distinctive brand aesthetic.

Designing New Products

• Lead the Design team in developing two annual collections plus additional capsule collections aligned to the Master List.
• Ensure all deliverables follow the Design & Development Cadence Calendar.

Building Design Assortments

• Support the Chief Brand Officer and Product Development team to build two annual product plans.
• Ensure assortments balance commercial performance, thematic cohesion, and the ongoing evolution of the brand toward a more modern MacKenzie-Childs aesthetic.
• Participate in Edits, Product Previews, New Product Meetings, and other key decision forums.
• Drive alignment to support annual revenue goals.

Host Cross-Functional Ideation Meetings Between Design and Product Development

• Facilitate seasonal ideation sessions following Planning's assortment planning process.
• Lead collaborative discussions between Design and Product Development focused on category-based product concepts.

Visualizing Category Potential

• Champion new product initiatives that drive incremental revenue while maintaining brand integrity.
• Identify emerging concepts that expand and evolve the brand.
• Clearly communicate creative vision to help cross-functional partners understand product potential.

Developing Annual Budget

• Own planning, management, and delivery of the Design budget within approved fiscal parameters.
• Review and approve department purchases and employee expense reports.
• Monitor and adjust spend throughout the fiscal year to ensure alignment with financial targets.

Supervisory Responsibilities:

This position supervises Designers and Design Assets Manager.

Education and Experience:

• High school diploma or GED

• 8-10 years previous experience in Creative leadership, management and product design. 
• Excellent organizational skills, coupled with strong intuition and a creative brain. 
• Creative leadership skills, balanced with solid commercial awareness and curiosity. 
• Diplomacy in communication, giving and receiving effective feedback, developing strong relationships.

Special Requirements:

Location: Aurora, NY

Travel: Required 

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:

• Computer proficiency including Adobe, Illustrator, InDesign for advanced Design and technical documents

• Highly organized and proactive about making and maintaining order in materials and information. 
• Ability to clearly and diplomatically communicate verbally and in writing.
• Manage own time effectively and motivate others to meet deadlines effectively in a high pressure, deadline driven environment
• Ability to think with both right and left brain, drawing basic conclusions from data to apply to creative decision making 

Equipment Used: 

Computer, printer, scanner, telephone, photocopier, calculator and various hand and power tools 

Computer Software:  Illustrator, In Design, Sketch Up, Photo Shop and AutoCAD

Physical and Mental Requirements:

• Ability to sit, stand, walk, talk, hear, reach, push, pull, lift, crouch, use fingers to grasp, handle, feel, and perform repetitive motions of hands or wrists.

• Close mental and visual attention required to plan or direct fairly complex work methods or operations that obtain size, shape, or physical qualities of product.

Environmental Conditions:

Work is performed in a typical office environment with occasional exposure to outside environmental conditions when photographing at outdoor locations. 

Salary Range: $125k-150k/Annually 

Benefits:

• Competitive salary commensurate with experience
• Comprehensive benefits package including medical, dental, and vision coverage
• 401K Retirement Savings + Company Match
• Paid Vacation, PTO and Holidays
• Company sponsored life insurance and LTD
• Health Savings Account + Company Match
• Generous Employee Discount
• Verizon Discount
• Referral Bonus Program
• Opportunities for professional development and career advancement

MacKenzie-Childs is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment. We are proud to be an equal opportunity employer and welcome applications from all qualified candidates.