Art Director

Job Description

Job Description

Position Summary

The Art Director is the visual creative leader of Playboy's brand universe. Reporting to the Chief Brand Officer & Editor-in-Chief, this role translates the aesthetic direction and visual identity of the brand across all platforms — print, digital, social, video, and experiential. This is both a strategic and hands-on position: the Art Director shapes Playboy's visual DNA, directs photo and video shoots from concept through final delivery, and ensures design coherence across a variety of touchpoints.

Playboy's visual heritage is among the most iconic in media history. The Art Director will be responsible for honoring that legacy while boldly evolving it for a new era — bringing a strong, distinctive point of view to typography, layout, color, photography, illustration, and overall visual direction across a dynamic, multiplatform brand ecosystem. This will be represented in our print magazine, our legendary Playmate shoots, and newer offerings, like short-form social video, newsletters, podcasts, and brand partnerships.

This role requires a proven creative leader with a track record in lifestyle media or prestige brand environments, deep relationships across the photography, styling, and design communities, and the ability to manage multiple high-priority shoots and projects simultaneously without sacrificing craft or vision.

What You'll Do

The essential job duties below are specific to this position. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform these essential functions.

Core Responsibilities

Creative & Visual Direction

• Iterate upon and translate Playboy's visual identity across editorial, digital, social, video, and experiential platforms.

• Communicate and maintain comprehensive Brand Guidelines covering design, typography, color, photography, and imagery standards.

• Translate the brand's editorial voice into compelling visual storytelling across all consumer touchpoints.

• Serve as the creative arbiter for all visual output — ensuring quality, consistency, and brand integrity across every channel.

Editorial Design & Layout

• Lead art direction for the print magazine, including layout, typography, cover design, and photo selection and sequencing.

• Direct digital content design across the website, newsletters, and editorial packages.

• Develop and maintain visual templates and design systems that enable scalable, high-quality content production across the team and with external partners.

Shoot Direction & Talent Relations

• Lead casting, briefing, and on-set oversight of photographers, directors, stylists, hair and makeup artists, set designers, and other creative collaborators for all editorial and brand shoots.

• Manage all phases of shoot production — from pre-production through final retouching and delivery — maintaining creative vision and financial discipline, and in partnership with the Playboy Operations Team or production agencies as required.

• Cultivate and grow a robust network of photographers, directors, illustrators, and creative collaborators aligned with Playboy's evolving identity.

Social, Video & Digital Creative

• Provide art direction and creative oversight for social media content across all platforms (Instagram, TikTok, X, YouTube, and beyond).

• Collaborate with the video production team on visual direction for Playboy's video content and video-forward editorial.

• Ensure visual consistency and brand coherence across all digital channels and formats.

Brand Guidelines, Licensing & Experiential

• Partner with the CBO/EIC and licensing team to maintain Brand Guidelines that reflect Playboy's evolving visual identity.

• Provide creative input and oversight on licensing initiatives, ensuring visual standards are upheld across all licensed product categories.

• Support experiential and brand partnership activations with creative direction, from concept through execution.

Team Leadership & Operations

• Lead and mentor a small in-house creative and design team, setting a high bar for craft and creative ambition.

• Manage an active network of external creative agencies, freelance designers, retouchers, and production vendors.

• Oversee art direction and design budgets, ensuring quality output within resource constraints.

• Build scalable, efficient workflows for visual asset delivery across platforms and deadlines.

• Foster a culture of creative excellence, collaboration, and accountability.

What You'll Bring

Skills / Abilities / Competencies:

• Exceptional design sensibility with a bold, confident, and distinctive visual point of view.

• Deep expertise in typography, layout, photography direction, color theory, and visual storytelling.

• Proven track record directing high-profile editorial and brand shoots across a range of formats, contexts, and budgets.

• A rich network of creative relationships across photography, illustration, styling, hair and makeup, and production.

• Demonstrated experience working within prestige media, fashion, entertainment, or lifestyle brand environments.

• Ability to manage multiple projects and shoots simultaneously with strong organizational skills and attention to detail.

• Fluency and comfort operating in a fast-moving, multiplatform content environment.

• Strong collaborator and communicator — able to articulate and defend creative vision to diverse internal and external stakeholders.

• Experience building and evolving visual identity systems and brand guidelines.

• Proficiency in Adobe Creative Suite (InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator) and familiarity with digital design tools (Figma, etc.).

• A genuine passion for Playboy's history, mission, and creative legacy — and equal excitement about its next chapter.

Education & Experience:

• 8+ years of art direction experience, with at least 3 years in a senior or lead creative role.

• Demonstrated experience in media, entertainment, fashion, or a prestige lifestyle brand environment.

• Strong portfolio showcasing editorial design, shoot direction, and multiplatform creative work.

• Experience managing small in-house teams alongside external creative talent networks.

What We Offer

• Competitive Medical/Dental/Vision insurance plans with FSA/HSA and Dependent Care FSA options

• Generous Family and Parental Leave Policy

• Pet Insurance for those who need it too!

• Dedicated Health and Wellness resources including Employee Assistance Program.

• Pretax Transportation/Commuter Benefits options

• Employee Resource Groups

• 401K program with Company match

• Flexible Time Away Plan

• Dynamic, inclusive workplace culture focused on innovation, impact, and employee well-being

What You'll be Part of

Playboy is one of the most recognizable, iconic brands in the world that started as a culture-driving, boundary-pushing magazine over 70 years ago. Today, Playboy is a consumer lifestyle business with digital and physical products available in 180 countries across entertainment, events, fashion, lifestyle, sexual wellness, consumer products and more. Our mission—to create a culture where all people can pursue pleasure—is built upon decades of creating groundbreaking media and hospitality experiences and fighting for cultural progress rooted in the core values of equality, freedom of expression, and the idea that pleasure is a fundamental human right. Playboy's sister company, Honey Birdette, is a rapidly growing luxury lingerie and sexual wellness brand with retail outlets across the US, Australia, and the UK.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Please note this job description is intended to convey information essential to understanding the scope of the job and the general nature, level, and expectation of the work to be performed. It is not designed to cover a complete list of qualifications, skills, efforts, duties and responsibilities or activities associated with this position, as they may change at any time, with or without notice.

Playboy is an equal-opportunity employer and is committed to providing a workplace free from harassment and discrimination. We are committed to recruiting, hiring, training and promoting qualified people of all backgrounds, and make all employment decisions without regard to any protected status. The right talent for us innately embodies our values. Come as you are.

Job Conditions

Individuals applying for this position should understand that Playboy's brands are focused on creative freedom, artistic expression, and sex positivity. As a result, the business concept is based partly on sex appeal, nudity, and/or sexual wellness products, which means that employees may be exposed to: individuals in sexy and/or sexually provocative clothing, either in person or in photographs or videos; lewd and/or obscene language; depictions of lewd, risqué, intimate or explicit acts or behaviors; conversations and discussions about sex, sexuality and the human anatomy; conversations and discussions where vulgar language may be used, and where sexual jokes and innuendo may be expressed in their presence (collectively the “Conduct”). While individuals should not apply for this position if they find a work environment as described above to be offensive, intimidating, hostile or unwelcome, nothing herein shall prevent them from notifying the Company immediately if they are exposed to conduct of any type–and at any time–with which they feel uncomfortable.