McLaren Automotive Ltd
Head of Design Details - Exterior
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What to Expect
The Head of Exterior Components holds company-wide accountability for the strategic direction, creative development, and delivery of exterior details and components across the McLaren product portfolio, establishing these elements as a critical expression of McLaren’s evolving luxury-performance brand.
The role defines how exterior details — including illumination, wheels, aerodynamic features, functional hardware, exterior graphics, sensors, and emerging technologies — contribute to the identity, sophistication, emotion, and perceived quality of every McLaren product.
As McLaren evolves from an authentic performance machine brand into a broader global luxury-performance brand, the role establishes the standards, creative principles, and design strategies required to ensure exterior details elevate product execution, craftsmanship, and perceived value across multiple vehicle segments and architectures.
The role provides creative leadership from early brand and product strategy through concept development, design maturation, and production delivery, ensuring that exterior components are not treated as isolated technical elements, but as an integrated and recognisable part of the McLaren design language.
The Head of Exterior Components acts as the senior authority for exterior detail strategy, setting the creative ambition, governance, quality thresholds, technical direction, and supplier model required to deliver distinctive, emotionally compelling, and technically credible solutions across the growing portfolio.
The role works closely with Exterior Design, Interior Design, Advanced Design, Engineering, Product Development, CMF, Brand, Marketing, Procurement, and suppliers to ensure detail design is consistently aligned to McLaren’s brand values, product positioning, and commercial objectives.
What You'll Do
Exterior Detail Strategy & Brand Standards
- Define and continuously evolve the strategic role of exterior components within the McLaren design language and brand identity.
- Establish clear design principles and standards for exterior details across all vehicle programmes and product segments.
- Define the hierarchy, character, and visual signature of key exterior components, ensuring they create recognisable and differentiated McLaren products.
- Establish the creative direction for key areas including:
- Illumination and lighting signatures
- Wheels and wheel architecture
- Aerodynamic and functional exterior elements
- Exterior graphics and badging
- Sensors, cameras, and technology integration
- Functional hardware and access points
- Exhaust and thermal elements
- Emerging exterior technologies and interfaces
- Ensure exterior components contribute to a coherent and sophisticated overall product proposition rather than becoming disconnected technical or styling features.
- Establish the quality and craftsmanship expectations required to support McLaren’s positioning as a global luxury-performance brand.
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What You'll Bring
Business Knowledge
- Significant senior leadership experience in exterior automotive design, component design, or a closely related premium/luxury design environment.
- Demonstrable success establishing design strategies and standards across multiple vehicle programmes or product categories.
- Deep understanding of how exterior details contribute to brand identity, product differentiation, perceived quality, and commercial value.
- Proven experience taking complex design features from early creative definition through development and production delivery.
- Experience working within premium, luxury, or performance automotive environments with demanding design and quality expectations.
- Strong understanding of the relationship between design, engineering, manufacturing, technology, procurement, and supplier capability.
- Experience managing significant supplier relationships, specialist partners, budgets, and external creative or technical resources.
- Strong industry network across automotive components, specialist manufacturing, illumination, wheels, materials, technology, and emerging suppliers.
Essential Functional / Technical Skills
- Degree in Automotive Design, Industrial Design, or equivalent senior-level experience in an automotive design environment.
- Deep understanding of exterior automotive design, component development, vehicle architecture, engineering constraints, and manufacturing processes.
- Strong knowledge of exterior lighting, wheels, aerodynamics, exterior graphics, functional components, materials, finishes, and emerging exterior technologies.
- Ability to translate brand strategy and product positioning into clear component design principles and creative direction.
- Strong understanding of luxury design, craftsmanship, perceived quality, and the relationship between detail and overall product value.
- Proven ability to lead multidisciplinary teams and influence senior stakeholders across Design, Engineering, Product Development, Manufacturing, Procurement, and suppliers.
- Ability to balance creative ambition with technical feasibility, cost, timing, and programme requirements.
- Excellent presentation and communication skills, with the ability to articulate design intent, strategic rationale, and commercial value to senior leadership.
- Strong problem-solving abilities, with the capacity to resolve complex technical and design challenges while protecting the core creative intent.
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What We'll Do for You
We offer a wide-ranging benefits package, which includes:
- Structured career development framework
- 25 days’ holiday, plus bank holiday. Annual buy & sell up to five days
- Enhanced company pension scheme
- Discretionary annual bonus award
- Private medical insurance and health cash plan
- Life assurance benefit
- Ability to apply for a sabbatical of up to one year after only two years’ service
- Benefits you can adapt to your lifestyle, such as discounted shopping
- Generous parental leave policies
- A range of wellbeing initiatives, such as employee assistance programme and free financial & mortgage advice
Who Are We?
No restraints. No limitations. We don’t simply push boundaries. We completely rethink them. McLaren Automotive exists to create breath-taking performance road cars.
It takes a community to do what we do. A diverse group of people with many areas of expertise, united by their passion to deliver visionary products and set new benchmarks.
McLaren Automotive commits to equal opportunity for all. Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion is at the heart of our impact, it drives our innovation and enables us to truly create something special. Join us on our journey.
Job Title
Head of Design Details - Exterior
Ref
59588
Date posted
Wednesday, October 7, 2026
Country
United Kingdom
Location
Bicester
Business area
Design
Department
Design
Position level
3 - Head of (L -20)
Working time
Full Time
Contract type
Permanent
Working pattern
9am - 6pm Monday to Friday
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