Lead Color Designer - Lifestyle - HOKA Footwear

The role accelerates HOKA Lifestyle Footwear’s footwear refresh engine, delivering newness, speed to market, and growth across lifestyle footwear. Sitting at the intersection of design, product, and merchandising, it elevates colour as a tool for storytelling, product differentiation, and consumer impact. The role reports to the Senior Manager, Colour Design – HOKA Footwear and calls for a strong point of view that pushes newness in product and translates insights into meaningful colour solutions from concept through final product.

• Lead colour design execution on category priority projects.
• Develop seasonal colour solutions across lifestyle footwear.
• Work against seasonal project briefs and franchise concepts, supporting new creation, refresh, and optioning strategies.
• Manage multiple creation calendars across inline, collaborations, and SMU projects.
• Build seasonal colour palettes and application strategies aligned to creative direction.
• Partner with product design, material design, development, merchandising, and marketing to deliver cohesive product stories.
• Support seasonal design strategy and contribute to category-level colour direction.
• Collaborate with footwear, material, and digital design teams to deliver a holistic product point of view.
• Contribute to seasonal creative direction and kick-off moments.
• Explore unbriefed opportunities that push HOKA expression and innovation in colour.

• Bachelor’s or master’s degree in industrial design, product design, or related field.
• 6–8 years’ experience in footwear colour design, with a focus on lifestyle or performance categories.
• Advanced understanding of colour theory, colour application, and storytelling in footwear.
• Strong knowledge of footwear construction, materials, and product process, including upper and tooling interaction.
• Ability to translate trends and consumer insights into product-relevant colour strategies.
• Proficient in Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, PowerPoint, Miro or Lucid.
• Familiarity with generative AI platforms such as Midjourney or Vizcom.
• Strong communication and collaboration skills.
• Portfolio demonstrating colour direction, trend insight, and product execution.

• Hybrid working arrangement with typically 3 times per week in office, Tuesday – Thursday.

• $96,600.00 – $ For Portland, Oregon.

• Competitive pay and bonuses, with a variety of compensation programmes to foster career development, reward success, and show employees they are valued.
• Financial planning and wellbeing support, including plans to protect income, pay for expenses, and invest in the future.
• Time away from work, with plans that support employees’ needs to get out, get healthy, and come back stronger.
• Extras, discounts, and perks, including generous discounts and community-based programmes.
• Growth and development opportunities and support for personal and professional development.
• Comprehensive health and wellness programmes and offerings to support a healthy lifestyle at work and at play.

Deckers Brands states that Together, Every Step is a promise kept that every employee can bring their authentic self, is valued and supported, as a whole person, at work and beyond. It describes Together, Every Step as how it continues to deliver exceptional business results, experience an amazing place to work, and have a positive impact on the communities and world around us.

Deckers Brands celebrates diversity of background, experiences, and unique identity, is committed to ensuring an inclusive and equitable workplace where all employees can Come as They Are, and believes that different perspectives make the organisation truly Better Together.