City Designer

We are seeking an experienced and imaginative City Designer with a strong background in designing for outdoor arts, festivals, public spaces, and urban environments.

The successful candidate will play a central role in shaping how audiences experience the festival across Newport. They will be responsible for creating a cohesive visual and spatial identity that connects multiple sites, events, and artistic interventions into a unified festival experience.

This role requires a designer who understands cities as living stages; someone who can work creatively with existing architecture, streetscapes, heritage assets, and public spaces to transform familiar environments into extraordinary places of gathering, participation, and celebration.

The City Designer will lead the development of the festival's physical design language, ensuring audiences can confidently navigate the city while encountering moments of surprise, discovery, and artistic engagement. Working closely with the Graphic Designer, they will translate the festival's visual identity into the public realm through wayfinding, signage, interventions, installations, temporary structures, audience infrastructure, and site dressing.

Alongside this practical function, the City Designer will collaborate with artists, performers, and creative teams to imagine new possibilities for public space. They will contribute to the design and creation of environments that support performance, participation, and social interaction, helping to blur the boundaries between audience and artwork.

The postholder will work closely with the Creative Director, Creative Producer, Production Manager, and City Centre Manager to ensure that design concepts are ambitious, achievable, safe, and aligned with the wider event management strategy.

As part of the festival's artistic development, the City Designer will also support the recruitment and selection of commissioned artists and designers, helping to shape how creative interventions sit within the wider city landscape and festival narrative.

We are particularly interested in hearing from designers who have experience working within theatrical contexts and large-scale participatory events. As the project explores mass movement, collective action, and civic participation, the City Designer will have opportunities to collaborate with the Movement Director and wider creative team on the development of visual interventions, objects, costumes, and large-scale participatory design elements that can animate the city and bring audiences together.

This is an exciting opportunity for a designer who is passionate about placemaking, heritage, public space, and the power of culture to transform how people experience their city.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the creative development of the festival's city-wide visual and spatial design strategy.

• Create a cohesive design language that connects multiple sites, venues, performances, and installations across Newport.

• Design and oversee the delivery of festival wayfinding, signage, audience information points, and public-facing infrastructure.

• Work alongside the Graphic Designer to ensure consistency between the festival brand and its physical manifestation within the city.

• Develop design proposals that enhance accessibility, audience experience, and navigation throughout the festival.

• Collaborate with artists, performers, architects, fabricators, and creative teams to realise installations and public realm interventions.

• Work with the Creative Director to shape the visual identity and atmosphere of the festival.

• Support the recruitment, selection, and integration of commissioned artists and creative practitioners.

• Collaborate with the Movement Director and wider artistic team on large-scale participatory design elements, including objects, costumes, and visual interventions.

• Attend stakeholder and planning meetings as required, communicating design concepts to partners and delivery teams.

• Work closely with the Production Manager to ensure all designs are technically feasible, budget-conscious, and compliant with health and safety requirements.

• Contribute to site planning, audience flow strategies, and public space activation across the festival footprint.

• Oversee the installation and implementation of design elements across festival sites.

Essential Criteria

• Significant experience designing for outdoor arts festivals, public events, or site-specific cultural projects.

• Strong portfolio demonstrating work within urban environments, public spaces, or placemaking contexts.

• Experience creating audience-centred environments, including wayfinding, public realm interventions, and spatial design.

• Understanding of how design can support audience engagement, accessibility, participation, and storytelling.

• Experience collaborating with artists, performers, communities, and multidisciplinary creative teams.

• Ability to translate creative concepts into practical and deliverable design solutions.

• Knowledge of fabrication processes, materials, temporary structures, and installation methods.

• Experience working within complex stakeholder environments and multi-partner projects.

• Strong project management and organisational skills.

• Experience working in Wales and an understanding of Welsh cultural contexts.

• Proficiency in relevant design software and digital collaboration tools.

Desirable Criteria

• Experience working on large-scale civic celebrations, cultural events, or city-wide festivals.

• Background in theatre design, scenography, performance design, or live event design.

• Experience designing for participatory and community-led projects.

• Knowledge of heritage sites and historic environments.

• Experience working with local authorities and public-sector partners.

• Welsh language skills.

• Qualification in Architecture, Spatial Design, Theatre Design, Urban Design, Landscape Architecture, or equivalent professional experience.