Who we are looking forWe're looking for a hands-on Principal Industrial Designer who gets excited about figuring out how a product should work, feel, and fit into someone's day. At Re:Build Kalamazoo, you might be exploring how a clinician handles a medical device on one project and refining the form and materials of a consumer product on the next. You'll work with clients, engineers, and manufacturing teammates to turn what you learn from users into sketches, models, and prototypes you can put in someone's hands. You'll own design work within projects, with scope to collaborate with research, shape the design direction, and guide clients through tough trade-offs as your experience grows.
What you'll get to do- Find the right problem to solve. Work with design and engineering leads to understand what the client needs to accomplish, help scope the project, and decide how to approach the work.
- Get close to the people using the product. User-Centered Design. Collaborate with research to understand how people use products, where they run into friction, and what would make the experience better. Draw on market research, ergonomics, and real-world use scenarios.
- Make ideas tangible. Explore concepts through sketches, renderings, study models, and CAD. Use prototypes to test ideas, communicate trade-offs, and refine the design as you learn.
- Shape how the product looks and feels. Make thoughtful decisions about form, materials, color, and finish that fit the client's brand and the way the product will be used.
- Stay involved as the design gets closer to production. Collaborate with engineering, procurement, production, and quality to work through the details that make a design manufacturable.
- Bring clients along. Present concepts and explain the thinking behind your decisions so clients can give useful feedback and move forward with confidence.
What you bring to the team- A bachelor's degree in Industrial Design, such as a BFA or BSID.
- At least fifteen years of industrial design experience in a corporate or consulting environment.
- Strong sketching, rendering, CAD, and prototyping skills, with the judgment to choose the right tool for the stage of the project.
- Clear written and verbal communication, strong organization, and the ability to manage deadlines across projects.
