Senior Designer – Women’s Apparel Full Time

The Role

As Senior Designer – Women’s Apparel, you’ll lead the women’s apparel design team in creating cohesive, compelling seasonal ranges that reflect Rip Curl’s brand DNA. You’ll stay deeply connected to our customer, use sales and market insight to sharpen the range edit, and guide product from concept through to final delivery.

This is a hands‑on leadership role where creative direction, commercial thinking and team development are equally important.

What You’ll Be Responsible For

Customer Insight

• Stay close to sales performance and sell‑through, leading your team to understand what’s working — and why.
• Bring the customer to life through real‑world insight, observing her at the beach, on social media and within culture.
• Use this understanding to build emotional connection and long‑term loyalty with the Rip Curl woman.

Range Planning

• Partner closely with the Head of Design and Head of Product to align early on seasonal briefs.
• Lead your team in creating strong, cohesive stories across the range with a clear and consistent visual identity.
• Balance trend relevance with commercial targets, staying close through development to protect margin and manage risk.

Design & Development

• Lead design direction across categories, driving concepts from research and briefing through to final product.
• Stay closely involved in fittings and approvals to ensure quality and design intent are delivered.
• Keep the team inspired with fresh trends, innovation and newness, while ensuring ideas translate into wearable, relevant product.
• Oversee execution across graphics, fabrications and trims, ensuring detail, clarity and smooth handover into development.
• Maintain a strong understanding of supplier capabilities and production considerations.

Core Capabilities We’re Looking For

• Creative direction & edit clarity: Confidently set the vision for the range and guide designs within a clear edit point.
• Commercial mindset: Balance creativity with what the customer will buy, using sales and insight to inform decisions.
• Team leadership & development: Support, challenge and grow your team, fostering accountability and high standards.
• Strong product eye: Obsess over detail — silhouette, fabrication, finishing and fit.
• End‑to‑end ownership: Stay connected from concept through to final product delivery.
• Collaboration & influence: Partner effectively with Design, Product and Marketing to bring the range to life.
• Customer obsession: Keep the Rip Curl woman at the centre of every decision.

What You’ll Bring

• Relevant tertiary qualifications in Fashion / Apparel Design
• Strong proficiency in Adobe Illustrator
• Experience leading or mentoring a design team
• Solid understanding of production processes and development challenges
• Flexibility, collaboration and a team‑first mindset
• Ability and availability to travel interstate and internationally as required

Tagged as: apparel, australia, design, designer, rip curl, senior designer, torquay, victoria, womernswear